


Past Meet Future

by Serlenia



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Episode: s01e22 Steven and the Stevens, Post-Steven Universe: The Movie, Steven Universe Future, Steven Universe Future Spoilers, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:53:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 38,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22039615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serlenia/pseuds/Serlenia
Summary: When the gems and Steven go to find the Legendary Glass of Time they all end up in the future instead of Steven messing with time. How will the gems and Steven react when they learn how peace was finally achieved across the galaxy? How will they get back home when this is a situation their future selves never dealt with?
Relationships: Ruby/Sapphire (Steven Universe)
Comments: 364
Kudos: 1035
Collections: Waiting for an Update GIGA-XISBASS Edition





	1. Amethyst equals Chaos

**Author's Note:**

> Hello there! This is my first story on this website.  
> Usually, I post stories on Fanfiction. However, I’ve liked the stories on here more when it comes to Steven Universe. So, I wanted to add to the awesome stories on this website. I might eventually add this story to the other website. Plus… this is sort of the first story I’ve written in a while due to life stuff. I feel almost bad for not going back and finishing those stories on Fanfiction first. However, I’ve had this story idea in my head for a while and I’m addicted to Steven Universe right now.  
> This story takes place during episode 22 ‘Steven and the Stevens’ in season one. Then, takes place after ‘Why So Blue?’ in Steven Universe Future.  
> I can’t remember when Steven finds out about corrupted gems so we are going to assume that he doesn’t know the gem monsters were once gems.  
> Also, episode 39 ‘Future Vision’ already happened. I forgot that Steven wouldn’t know about Garnet’s future vision yet and I really didn’t want to go through and change everything. So, we are going to pretend that Future Vision happened sometime before episode 22.  
> No beta unfortunately.

Steven and the other gems were looking around the room filled with hourglasses. This wasn’t the gems’ first time being in this very room, but it was Steven’s first time. To say that the thousands of hourglasses were amazing would be an understatement. Steven couldn’t even begin to think of the words to describe the view in front of him. Not to mention the ocean view from the glass windows that surrounded them!

He just got done trying to convince Pearl that his hourglass was correct, because it was adorable, when Amethyst came swinging over to him. She had stretched out her arms so she could swing from the ceiling and be close to the top shelf of the building that held more hourglasses. Steven let out a small giggle at her antics, her long arms looked like big purple noodles.

Hearing Steven's laughs, Pearl glanced over to see what was happening. She shook her head in annoyance when she saw what Amethyst was doing. “Amethyst! Be careful!” Pearl yelled at her.

“Jeesh, I am! Don’t be a party pooper!” Amethyst yelled back at Pearl, taking the time to turn her body so she could look Pearl in the face. This turned out to be a mistake because she crashed into Steven which sent them into Steven’s cute hourglass and the many hourglasses surrounding it. 

Pearl let out a startled gasp. Garnet, who had been thinking about the likelihood of an ornate hourglass being the correct choice, turned around to look at the source of the noise. 

“Ehh, whoops?” Amethyst shrugged and picked Steven up from where they fell while trying to avoid the glass. She brought Steven over to where the other two were, trying to discreetly wipe the glass off of Steven’s clothes so Pearl wouldn’t freak out. However, it was too late to avoid Pearl’s meltdown. 

“AMETHYST! What did you do! We’ve never broken one of these before. And you involved Steven in this mess!” Pearl yelled at Amethyst. Then she turned to Steven, almost in tears over the thought of him being hurt, “Steven!” She grabbed Steven’s shoulders, “Steven, are you okay?” However, before he could answer her, Pearl then gasped, “Oh no! Garnet, what is going to happen now?” she asked, turning to Garnet. 

Amethyst just stood there, trying not to roll her eyes at Pearl's hysterics. She did wince in sympathy for Steven, who found himself crushed against Pearl as she freaked out.

“Brace yourselves”, was all Garnet said before the sand started to swirl up in the air, mixing with the water that had started falling from the ceiling.

“But we need to get to the warp pad! We need to get out! Oh, Steven come here!” Pearl continued and grabbed Steven, who had almost been successful in escaping her grasp before he found himself right back where he started. 

Steven groaned in annoyance and then his eyes lit up as he thought about what the sand tornado might mean. “Does this mean one of the hourglasses we crashed into was the correct one?” Steven asked, watching in wonder, and slight fear, as the tornado of sand and water grew larger. 

“Yes.” Garnet answered for Steven. Then she turned to Pearl, “No time to escape. We wouldn’t make it.” Garnet said. She grabbed all of them and they all held on to each other, trusting that this was the best solution according to Garnet. What they didn’t know was that Garnet wasn’t sure what would happen right after they got sucked up by the tornado. She knew this action would lead to the best outcome, but she couldn’t get a vision to come through on where they would end up after this. 

More and more sand and water got picked up as the tornado grew larger and began swirling faster and faster. Just as Pearl started to worry about Garnet’s choice and Steven’s safety, the tornado picked them up. It felt similar to warping as they shot up into the air. However, that was the only thing similar about this situation.

The landing was rough as they all hit the ground hard. 

“Urg, never let me do something like that again.” Amethyst said her indent in the ground.

“Well, if you weren’t so careless and irresponsible that wouldn’t have happened to begin with!” Pearl said as she carefully moved Steven off of her from where he had been sitting on top of her. She had held him and used her body as a shield from the impact into the ground, knowing that the impact might have really hurt Steven who was still learning to control his powers. After Steven was safely on the ground, she stood up and began brushing the sand off of her body.

“Ugh, I was just trying to reach that really cool swirly one towards the top. Jeesh.” Amethyst said, rolling her eyes at Pearl.

Before the argument could continue, a long “Guyyyyssssss…..” came from Steven a few feet away. 

Garnet, who had been cleaning herself off and was getting ready to stop the two gems from fighting, glanced over at Steven. Pearl and Amethyst also stopped their argument at the sound of Steven’s nervous voice. “What is it, Steven?” Garnet asked walking up to him. 

“Look!” Steven pointed stars in his eyes.

All three gems looked up to where Steven pointed and all three of them tensed up at once. 

“What the heck!” Amethyst shouted, coming to stand by Steven and stare at the sight in front of them.  
“Why does that….” Pearl trailed off, unsure of how to voice her concerns.  
“Why does it look like there is a mini Homeworld on Earth.” Garnet growled out. 

“Okay, but like, that wasn’t here when we left, was it? Look, the temple is just beyond it!” Steven exclaimed. His excitement made him disregard the gems' reactions as the gems stood there, tense and uncertain, trying to figure out their next move. 

After hearing Steven’s statement, the gems turned to look and there stood their temple, still by the beach. However, even from far away, the temple itself looked different. Almost newer and bigger maybe?

“This. is. too. weird.” Amethyst said as she kept looking between the new city and the temple. 

“It’s like an alternate universe or maybe even the future!” Steven exclaimed, thinking of all the possibilities. 

The gems ignored Steven’s comment, too worried about what this city might mean.  
“What do we do Garnet?” Pearl asked, her arms wrapped around her middle as if she were trying to comfort herself or hold herself together.

“We use stealth.” Garnet replied before marching forward.

The gems and Steven looked at each other. They weren’t exactly off to a stealthy start with their entrance, but no one had come running either. The gems ran after Garnet towards this new city. They caught up to her as they reached the outskirts of the city and then they almost slammed into Garnet when she suddenly stopped.  
“What’s up?” Amethyst asked.

“No… it can’t be…” Garnet said slowly. 

Curious, the other three glanced around her. To Amethyst and Steven, their shock and amazement came from all of the different gems walking around. Some looking partially corrupted, some off-color, and others looking perfectly fine. Although, Steven didn’t know why the gems all looked different. However, for Garnet and Pearl, their eyes were on one gem in particular. 

Up ahead was a forge and just in their line of sight was Bismuth working away at the metal. She was explaining loudly and jovially to the gems around her how hot the metal had to be to shape it and how to tell when it was hot enough.

“What is this Garnet…” Pearl asked her, her voice wavering as she looked at one of her old friends. A friend she thought she had lost a long time ago.

“I don’t know. My future vision is… blurry right now.” She responded back to Pearl. She might not be good at showing emotion, but the tightness in her voice gave away how affected she was by this new situation. 

“Whaaa….! Your future vision is a no go?” Amethyst exclaimed, turning to look at Garnet.  
It was loud enough to catch the attention of the gems and Bismuth who glanced into the woods. Luckily, the gems hid away fast enough. Although, Pearl had to grab Steven since he looked about ready to walk into the city. 

“Aww, Pearl,” Steven complained.  
Pearl shushed him. At the forge, the gems turned back to Bismuth and she began talking to them again. The Crystal Gems took a big sigh of relief. At least, until Bismuth dismissed them and began walking towards their hiding spot. 

“Hey, hello!” Bismuth started as she walked closer. “Lost gem in the woods?” she asked, “Or… er, a nervous gem in the woods?” she continued, laughing nervously. “It’s alright to be nervous. We welcome all gems here if that’s what you are worried about.”  
Bismuth stopped at the edge of the woods and waited a moment. However, patience was never her strong suit, “I know I heard something over here. My hearing is impeccable!” she said with confidence.

“Oh Garnet, I think it really is her.” Pearl whispered and began to tear up. She struggled to hold herself back from running towards the former Crystal Gem. 

“I- I don’t know.” Garnet said softly. She seemed to be concentrating on something that none of them could see.

“Okay, er… maybe you want to be left alone, but the woods are not a good place for anyone to wander in if they aren’t familiar with it. Doesn’t matter if you are human or gem. Come on out and I can show you some quiet places to hang out at.” Bismuth said.

“What do we do? Do you guys know her?” Amethyst whispered to the other two. She shifted in place, feeling anxious about what to do. Usually, she was an act first, think later kinda gem. However, the other two gems' reactions had her pausing and feeling unsure. 

Steven stood there watching the gems' reactions and looking at the unknown gem in front of them. It took him exactly one second to decide on what he would do. Being Steven, he did the most Steven thing possible. He popped out at the gem from behind the trees, “Hello!” he said running up to the gem and smiling at her. After all, she seemed really nice and Pearl and Garnet looked weirdly happy to see her; even if they were refusing to go out and greet her. So, she had to be okay right?

“Whoa there! Steven? Wha-why do you look like that?” Bismuth asked, stumbling over her words. “Oh, is this a joke? Like, what was it… like April fools? Or maybe this is the Steven tag the others talk about?” Bismuth asked with a nervous laugh. 

“Huh?” Steven asked he had never met this gem before, but she already knew his name!

“Steven!” the three gems yelled while rushing out towards him. Pearl pulled Steven behind her as the other two stood ready to defend themselves in front of Bismuth.

“Oh, whoa. Heyyy….” Bismuth said before trailing off. She started backing up with her hands up. “Uh, okay… if this is an April fool’s thing… Um, I think I’m good on earth customs for a while Steven. This is just too weird for me.” Bismuth said with a strained smile. After the whole rejuvenation thing, something like this just felt uncomfortable to her. 

“This is a joke, right? Not some twisted version of a rejuvenator? Because these were not the results last time you guys got hit by it.” She added as the tense silence grew between her, the gems, and Steven. 

“What? What are you talking about?” Pearl asked. “We just came from an accident with…. Oh. Oh, my! Garnet!” Pearl yelled suddenly, turning to Garnet. “What if… What if this is the result of the hourglasses? Well, not all of them, but we obviously found the correct one for this to be the outcome? We must be…. In the future maybe?” Pearl explained and then began pacing back and forth. Bismuth, Steven, and Amethyst watched her as Garnet stood stiffly. “Although, the legendary glass of time wasn’t meant to go this far back or forth in time!” Pearl ended while she threw her arms up in the air with exasperation. 

“That would explain why my future vision hasn’t been working. Hopefully, once it adjusts to this time period it will become more stable.” Garnet said, more confident of herself as she relaxed. 

“Wait… you’re saying that you guys are from… the past?” Bismuth asked slowly. She looked them over and could admit that might not be far from the truth. They all looked so different. She had never seen the outfits they were wearing right now. Steven looked the most familiar out of all of them since she first met him when he was this small. However, even with Steven, there was this innocence and immaturity that she never saw in him before. “Man… if you are from the past. How far back? You guys seem really young.” Bismuth said rubbing the back of her head. “Actually, don’t answer that yet. I think you guys need a meeting with your future selves.” She said, cutting them off before they could say anything. “Ugh, but how to do that without causing a scene?” Bismuth asked herself, deep in thought. 

“Um, how about we hide in the forge and you close it up? Then you can go get them… us?” Steven asked unsure. It sounded weird to be talking about himself and he almost giggled. However, this was a time for serious Steven. 

“Sounds good to me!” Bismuth said nervously. She rushed behind them and began herding them towards the forge. Thankfully, no other gems were too close to the area and any gems that were nearby weren’t paying attention to the oddity taking place a few feet away. They made it to the forge in record time with Bismuth following behind them and closing up the windows. “Okay, I’ll be right back!” She said after finishing up. She closed the door and locked it before running away.

“Uh, should we have done this? How do we know this isn’t a trap or something?” Amethyst asked, leaning against one of the anvils.

“It’s not,” Garnet said. “My future vision is coming back and I can say with certainty that we are in the future. More specifically we are around three years in the future.” She told them all.

“Whoa… all this change in three years? Cool!” Steven said happily. He wished he could go back outside and explore the city they found themselves in.

“This is all… quite sudden. I mean, what about…” Pearl trailed off, glancing at Garnet. 

“Unclear. I’m not sure how all this happened, but it does look like we found a cure…” Garnet said.

“A cure?” Steven asked, “A cure for what?”

“Oh, the gems!” Amethyst exclaimed, “The gem monsters used to be good ‘ol regular gems!”

“Amethyst!” Pearl hissed through gritted teeth. “We agreed-“

“Oh please, if we’re in the future then he’s definitely gonna find out!” Amethyst interrupted. 

“Wait! The gem monsters we fight are… gems? Like gem, gems?” Steven asked, eyes wide.

Pearl sighed, “Yes Steven. The gems became corrupted from an attack. We don’t have a cure in our time, despite how hard your mother worked to find one. The best we can do is poof and bubble the gems to keep them safe. All those gems that we saw, that had those blotches and horns, were once corrupted. One would almost assume they were becoming corrupted, but that can’t be the case. They wouldn’t just be walking around if that was true.”

“Whoa…” Steven said, thinking deeply on the subject. This lasted a couple of minutes before he got distracted by something in the forge. The other gems gathered together while Steven was occupied.  
“So, what do we do?” Amethyst asked them, “Do we ask them to help us get back? Maybe this happened to them too?” 

“The best thing to do right now is to wait for Bismuth to come back with- us,” Garnet told them, hesitating over the last word. It was a really strange predicament they were in. “I see us meeting ourselves, but we shouldn’t just bombard them with questions right away. Imagine if someone came up and did that to you. What you would feel is what your future self would feel.”

“Okay, if you say so.” Amethyst said, before losing interest in their meeting and wandering off. 

The whole situation made Pearl want to start yelling at Amethyst again. If only the mission had gone smoothly. They could have gone home; she could be making Steven a snack and not stuck pondering all the unknowns of this new situation. For example, what happened to the diamonds? There is no way they could exist like this without the diamonds knowing. What about-

What about Steven! Do they know? Do they know the truth about Rose and Pink Diamond? Even thinking of the situation made Pearl’s hands come up to cover her mouth. 

“Pearl? Are you okay?” Steven asked her, tugging on one of her arms. He had been happily exploring until he saw her distress and came over to check on her.

Pearl tugged her hands away from her mouth, “Oh yes! No need to worry Steven. We are going to be fine!” She told him, her voice strained as she rushed through the words.

“Er… okay? If you say so…” Steven said slowly, glancing at Pearl worriedly before going back to examine the swords lined up on the wall.

“Garnet,” Pearl whispered, “What about-“ she started and had to clear her voice, she almost couldn’t complete the sentence. “What about… the diamonds?” she said as softly as possible.

Garnet froze, if she was honest it hadn’t really crossed her mind. Sapphire wanted to blame Ruby’s lack of focus, but honestly neither had thought about it. Pearl brought up a good point. If Earth had become some type of safe space for all gems, there was no way they could stay hidden from the diamonds. No way. Garnet looked at Pearl, “Well, that is one important question to ask ourselves. However, if no one here is concerned then there must be a good reason why. We should trust ourselves and the other gems, if they aren’t worried then we shouldn’t worry either.” She told Pearl. Before their conversation could go any further, Amethyst interrupted them. 

“When are they gonna be here Garnet?” Amethyst whined, laying on an anvil with the upper part of her body hanging off of it. 

Before Garnet could answer her, the doors slammed open startling everyone except Garnet.


	2. Naming Yourself is Hard Work

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, you guys! Thank you for the kudos and comments ^_^. It made my day when they started coming in after I posted the story! Seriously, I didn’t think it would get this much attention. You guys have certainly inspired me to update as quickly as possible!
> 
> This chapter did take longer than expected due to work and life. However, while writing this chapter, I did happen to find an awesome beta!  
> I had a few people volunteer to help beta this story, but the one I decided on had experience being a beta on here and has quite a few fics herself on Ao3. Although, I do thank everyone who volunteered to help me. I really appreciated it since I'm just starting out on here!
> 
> **So, thank you to DekuEAM who was kind enough to beta this chapter (and hopefully more in the future)! She really helped fix it up and make it flow better. She was also a very fast worker! So, again, thank you DekuEAM! I really appreciate the help :)**

“Here they are!” Bismuth said loudly. Although, they didn’t know whether she was talking to them or the group standing behind her.

“Bismuth, this seriously better not be some sort of trick or surprise.” A stern voice answered the loud gem, sounding tired. “Because if it is, this is setting our schedules back for no reason.”

“For the last time, no! Do you really think I’m the type to joke about something like this?” Bismuth countered, sounding annoyed.

“Well… no…” The person-or gem- answered back, the same one from before. It wasn’t a voice any of them recognized right away, but if this group was their future selves, then there was only one option left of who it could be. However, none of them really wanted to think about that at the moment. Except for Steven, who had stars in his eyes wondering if that’s really what he sounded like in the future.

“If it helps at all, I can say with certainty that this is no trick.” This time the voice sounded familiar, it sounded like... Garnet. “My visions were uncertain before, but they’ve been getting clearer since the walk over here.”

The three of them looked up at Garnet who was standing quite still after hearing her own voice. Steven didn’t know this yet, but the other gems knew this meant that Garnet was either unsure about the situation, or the two gems who were fused to make her were arguing inside her head. Garnet knew this was coming, but it was still unsettling to hear her own voice. It felt  _ wrong. _

The shadows behind Bismuth became clear as the group finally stepped into the forge. Bismuth closed the heavy door behind them, standing off to the side as both groups stared at each other in shock. Bismuth stayed off to the side, content to watch what happened next.

“Whoa.” Amethyst’s eyes widened in shock, her jaw dropping open. 

“This is…” Pearl started but trailed off. She didn’t have the words to finish her statement.

“This. is. AWESOME!” Steven shouted, the stars in his eyes back in full force as he ran over to the stunned group.

“Wait, Steven!” Pearl yelled, grabbing him by the back of his shirt and quickly pulled him into her arms. Steven yelped in surprise, caught off guard from suddenly being pulled back.

“Pearl!” Steven huffed, pouting as he crossed his arms in annoyance, knowing he wouldn’t be able to get out of her grip. 

The group who stood before them… Was  _ them _

Both of the groups stood in silence, staring at each other. Each side was trying to figure out what their next move should be, and, at the same time, marveling over the many differences they noticed in each other. Well, all except for Young Steven who was pouting at Pearl for holding him back, his thought process being that he should be safe around himself and the older versions of his family.

When Steven was done pouting, he did take the time to glance back over at the group. The stars returned when he got a chance to really look at them. His eyes were drawn to himself first, because wow, he looked so cool! Older Steven was taller, and he had this cool pink jacket, and that shirt! He was glad that he was still wearing a star shirt. The shirt itself being black just made him that much cooler. His eyes then wandered to each of the gems. Their outfits had changed! Pearl even had a cool jacket too! Their older selves were jacket buddies! Steven knew their outfits changed when they poofed. So, he started thinking about why they would have poofed, and how many times they poofed to get to their current outfit.

On the other side of things, Older Steven looked at the group and wanted to cringe when Pearl grabbed his younger self. This was quickly becoming one of the most awkward moments ever. It was slowly getting right up there with meeting the other Rose Quartzes.

He had forgotten how clingy Pearl had been when he was younger. She had always been unhealthily obsessed with his wellbeing, or at least that’s what it felt like when he looked back at his younger years. When she wasn’t obsessing over him, she was talking about Rose and how amazing she had been. It wasn’t like it was just her that did that, but she was definitely the worst when it came to praising Rose. Of course, all the trials and challenges they endured together changed how everyone thought about Rose. They had all grown so much over these past few years that he had almost forgotten how it used to be. Looking at his younger self and younger Pearl, he was really happy that Pearl was able to move on; that they  _ all _ were able to move on.

_ Did I really move on though? _ Older Steven shook his head.  _ Time to stop that train of thought. _

He must have zoned out while thinking about this because when he finally looked up he saw all eyes on him. “Um, what did I miss?” 

Future Pearl was the first one to answer him, looking a bit nervous about the whole situation. “We decided that we should probably make ourselves comfortable before we all talked... I was asking you if you thought the idea of staying here to talk was good, or if you thought we should move the conversation somewhere else.”

“Oh, um..” Older Steven hummed, his eyebrows furrowing as he thought, “Well we can’t really use the warp pad without being seen, and it’s kind of a long walk from here to our house. But Bismuth has another class soon, and this isn’t exactly the most...  _ comfortable  _ location.” He looked to his side, turning to his Garnet, who had yet to say anything. “What do you think Garnet? Do you think we could make it back to our house without issues?” 

The past gems watched this interaction with interest. Pearl kept wondering why she would turn to Steven over Garnet first, of course Garnet would know what to do. Why would Steven know? He was just a child, not a leader.

Before Future Garnet could answer, Younger Steven spoke up, “WAIT!” he yelled out. He freed himself from Pearl’s grip, “Before we continue, I think we all need names!” He said, making a fist and slamming it down on his open palm as if to make his statement final.

Past Pearl looked down at him with a frown. “Steven, not now. We need to figure out where to go first.” 

Older Steven smiled and shook his head. He appreciated his younger self’s enthusiasm. “No, younger me is right. It’s going to get really confusing calling everyone younger or older, or future and past. We need a better naming system.” He smiled at both groups.

The future gems laughed and agreed, while Past Pearl looked speechless at the reactions, “But- we… Oh, alright.” She relented, uncertain at this different relationship she was seeing between their future selves and Steven. Past Amethyst looked on with interest while Past Garnet was standing still, her face completely unreadable.

“Okay, younger me, what are your ideas?” Older Steven asked his younger self.

“Hmmm... Well, I’m still thinking of names for us. I was thinking Steven number 1 and number 2, but then we would have to fight over who gets what number.” Younger Steven told him.

“Eh, yeahhhh. Let’s not do that.” Older Steven said, thinking of his own mishap with time.

“I was thinking for the future gems they could have nicknames!” Younger Steven smiled.

Older Steven froze up for a moment before laughing. Although his laugh sounded somewhat forced. “That-that sounds good to me,” Older Steven started and had to clear his voice before he continued, “I just recently nicknamed another gem so we didn’t have two with the same name,” he told his younger self before turning to the future gems. “What do you guys think?” He asked them.

They looked at each other and seemed to come to a conclusion before turning back to face Older Steven. “I think we can deal with that.” Future Amethyst said, shrugging with a small grin on her face.

Future Pearl and Future Garnet nodded their agreement to her statement. “It could be fun. Volley has enjoyed her nickname after all. I’m sure she’ll enjoy the fact that I’ll have a nickname now.” Future Pearl replied, a small smile on her face. After Pink Pearl received the nickname Volleyball from Steven, she shortened it to Volley to make it easier.

Older Steven tried to smile at their response, but it came out as more of a grimace after Pearl’s comment. Thankfully, no one seemed to notice.

Younger Steven smiled widely. The younger gems, his family, would never let him do this! He usually had to beg them to play Steven tag or play anything with him really. They were always so busy and serious. Except maybe Amethyst, she wasn’t really serious but she did always seem to have somewhere to be. When she wasn’t busy, it was hard to keep her attention when anything they did together seemed to bore her after a few minutes. He took a moment to glance at his family, and their expressions confirmed his thoughts on the matter. Pearl stood there looking shocked at her future self’s response. Amethyst just looked amused. Garnet… well, no one could really tell what she was thinking. 

Older Steven also noticed the reactions of the past gems. He shook his head at Past Pearl’s reaction and was slightly concerned about how still Past Garnet has been. Hopefully this wasn’t causing too much trouble with her components. He almost snorted at Past Amethyst’s reaction. He loved the fact that she hadn’t changed much and had just become more mature. Amethyst has always been pretty chill about big revelations and she was someone he could usually count on. Even if her new maturity somewhat bothered him now, but that was dumb. He should be happy for her.

_ Okay, stop spacing out Steven. Bad timing. _ Older Steven thought, focusing back to the situation at hand.

Younger Steven was pacing now, clearly thinking of nicknames for the future gems. “Let’s see…” Younger Steven started, “Names for Pearl… How about Earl? Or Pear?”

Future Pearl laughed, “Isn’t Earl a male name?” she asked him. She seemed to be enjoying interacting with Younger Steven.

It made Older Steven wonder if she preferred his younger self. Back when he was fun, playful, and looked up to her and the other gems. He quickly shook his head at the thought.  _ Ugh, focus Steven. _ He wasn’t sure why he was being so negative all of a sudden. Was it because of seeing his younger self and the past gems?

“Oh! I know!” Younger Steven exclaimed. “What about Dewdrop? Don’t people compare dewdrops to pearls sometimes?” Younger Steven asked.

“Um, I don’t know… Maybe?” Future Pearl said.

“Yeah, they do sometimes.” Older Steven answered. “What do you think Pearl? Any nickname stick out to you?” He asked her.

“I am partial to the nickname Dewdrop. I like the effort your younger self put into it. A little more effort than you put into Volley’s. That was quite silly, but she certainly seems to like it anyway.” Pearl said, teasing Older Steven.

“Ha, ha… yeah. Moving on!” Older Steven said awkwardly. His cheeks seeming to glow pink for a moment before the color faded. The past gems noticed the glow but figured it was the lighting from the forge. The future gems all glanced at each other. Only Future Pearl, now Dewdrop, seemed to be concerned.

“Are you alright?” Dewdrop asked Steven.

“I’m fine! Perfectly fine!” Older Steven said quickly before continuing, “Okayyy, we have a nickname for our Pearl now. What about Amethyst?” Older Steven asked his younger self.

Everyone was a little weirded out by Dewdrop and Steven’s exchange, but they realized it could be addressed later once they were at a different location.

Younger Steven looked closely at his older self, wondering what just happened. However, even he realized they needed to get this done and get out before Bismuth’s next class. “Um, hmmmm…” Younger Steven started thinking, “Amy? Ame? Maybe another word for purple like Violet or Lilac?” Younger Steven asked.

Everyone turned to Future Amethyst who seemed to be thinking over the options, “Well, those are definitely more serious nicknames than what I could come up with.” She started. “I like Ame. Sometimes Vidalia calls me that.” She said.

“Really?” Older Steven asked. “I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah, it was a nickname she gave me when we first started hanging out. She was the one who introduced me to nicknames.” Ame added.

“Oh, so we have her to blame for all those horrible nicknames you gave us.” Dewdrop teased her, giving her a playful shove in the arm.

“Eh, you know you loved them. Might have to bring them back to remind you of how great they are.” Ame said smirking at Dewdrop, her arms crossed.

“Oh, no. That’s alright.” Dewdrop said, slightly nervous. She was actually glad those days were over with. She had never really appreciated the nicknames appointed to her by Ame.

The past gems watched the exchange with curiosity and interest. Even past Garnet was relaxing a little and enjoying the exchange. The two gems who made her had calmed down, so she wasn’t struggling to stay together anymore. She was happy to see that in the future they seemed to have a better relationship with each other. She knew how badly their Steven took it when the two fought or when there was any fighting between any of them. She had worried that Amethyst and Pearl would never be able to move on from how Rose’s decision hurt them.

Pearl and Amethyst were slightly freaked out by the exchange and looked at each other in disbelief. It wasn’t like they didn’t have their moments where they could get along, but this was just weird. Pearl wasn’t even sure if they ever got along this well when Rose was still alive.

“Okay, we have a nickname for Amethyst. Last, but not least, we need a nickname for future Garnet.” Older Steven said, moving on before Ame could start coming up with weird nicknames for everyone.

“Oh!” Younger Steven shouted, stars in his eyes, “I was thinking Crimson! The color Garnet is a really dark red and so Crimson is another word for red. Plus, Crimson sounds cool and Garnet is the coolest!” Younger Steven finished, smiling at his Garnet and then looking at Future Garnet.

“I would be honored to have the nickname Crimson. Thank you, Steven.” Future Garnet told Younger Steven, smiling.

Older Steven smiled at the exchange. Garnet was definitely pretty cool and the rock of the group. Even though she had her moments, she was the one they usually all looked to for advice and leadership. Although, he has noticed that all of them seemed to be turning to him more and more on what to do when a situation arises. It was… different and somewhat stressful. Not that he didn’t like being needed and helping, but it was a lot of pressure.

“Man, did ya hear that Pear- er, Dewdrop? I guess we aren’t cool.” Ame said, teasing Younger Steven.

“Wha-! That’s not what I meant!” Younger Steven said, panicking.

Older Steven snorted and shook his head. “She’s teasing you. Of course, they realize they are cool too. Garnet is just cooler than them.” He told them all.

“Ouch, shots fired!” Ame said as she fell to the floor dramatically. “How can we ever move on!”

Dewdrop laughed, “Okay, as fun as this is, we need to get going soon. Bismuth’s class starts in a few minutes.” She said glancing at her phone.

Older Steven startled; he had forgotten to keep track of the time. He had actually started to have fun during this whole naming process.

“Oh!” Younger Steven said, “But we haven’t come up with names for me or… um, older me?” he said, looking sad.

“We’ll have time later once we get to the house,” Crimson told them all. “Dewdrop is correct, we don’t have any time left to stay here. Gems will be arriving soon.”

“So, what is the best way to get to the house?” Older Steven asked Crimson. During their time coming up with names, he had been thinking of ways to sneak everyone over to the house without alerting other gems or humans. Until they could talk and figure out their next steps it was best that no one else finds out yet. They didn’t need to accidentally mess up the timeline or something. He wasn’t really sure what would happen, but it was best not to take any chances.

“We need a distraction,” Crimson announced with a wide grin. Dewdrop, Ame and Older Steven looked at each other; they all knew what that grin meant. It was Crimson’s fusion grin.

“Okayyy… who’s fusing as a distraction?” Older Steven asked.

“What? Fusion!” Pearl yelped, “But don’t we only do that if it’s absolutely necessary and needed?” She asked. Besides Garnet, they never really fused for fun or for something as simple as this. It was used for serious things because the relationship needed for casual fusion wasn’t there.

“Things have changed.” Dewdrop told them, smiling. “I mean, yes, fusion is still only done when ‘needed’ but the term needed has changed. It’s not just to take care of something serious anymore. Sometimes it is used to teach classes. Our fusion with someone else is sometimes better at teaching a class than us as two separate beings.”

“Wait! Fusion… Like the giant woman that Pearl and Amethyst turn into or Amethyst and Garnet!?” Younger Steven yells out, stars in his eyes.

Older Steven blushed at his younger self’s enthusiasm. “Heh, yeah, like that.” He told his younger self.

“Ohhhhh!” Younger Steven yelled out. “Oh, oh! Are Garnet and Pearl gonna fuse? Are all three of you gonna fuse?” he asked excitedly.

Crimson’s grin got wider.

Garnet took notice and straightened up, looking at her older self with interest.

“I have something even better.” Crimson told Younger Steven. Everyone could make out the excitement in her voice, except for Younger Steven who was getting more excited by imagining what she could be talking about. “Have you ever wondered if you could fuse with any of us?” she asked Younger Steven.

Older Steven rolled his eyes, “Come on Crimson, everyone knows the answer is-“

“YES! YES, YES, YES!” Younger Steven shouted, interrupting Older Steven. “I  _ have _ wondered!” Steven yelled and ran up to Crimson, this time Pearl let him. “Are you saying I can??” he asked, grabbing onto Crimson’s arm and jumping up and down.

Crimson laughed and picked Steven up so she could get him to let go. “Yes, you can.” She replied and then put him back down in front of her.

“Well, we were thinking of having Steven practice fusion dancing with us soon. Are you saying it worked?” Pearl asked.

“Nah, that didn’t work. It took  _ forever _ for him to fuse with one of us.” Ame said to Pearl.

“Oh yeah? Who did he fuse with first?” Amethyst asked, “I bet it was Garnet.”

Crimson smiled, “Oh no, I was actually the last one he fused with, but let’s not give out any spoilers just yet.” She warned and then turned to Older Steven. “Did I use that word correctly Steven?” she asked.

“Yeah, you did.” Older Steven told her. “So, who did you have in mind?” he asked.

Crimson’s smile returned and got bigger.

Ame rolled her eyes, “Come on, ain’t it obvious who she wants it to be. She wants to show off” Ame said, teasing Crimson and Older Steven.

“Now, the question is who would be the best for a distraction?” Dewdrop asked, trying to think logically even though she was quite excited to show off too.

“Well, the answer is obvious, it should be-“ Older Steven started.

“Sunstone!”

“Smoky Quartz!”

“Rainbow Quartz 2.0!”

Three voices rang out at once, interrupting Older Steven.

Older Steven looked at the three in amusement. “Actually, I was going to say Sardonyx.” He told them. “She would be perfect for a distraction. She’s all about entertaining and being in the center of the spotlight.”

“Aw, but that’s no fun! They’ve already seen her, except maybe Steven.” Ame whined. “Besides, Garn-Crimson got your younger self all excited to see you fuse.” She added, throwing a hand out in Younger Steven’s direction.

Older Steven looked at his younger self which was a mistake. His younger self was in full-blown puppy eyes mode. “Yikes… I think I understand now Crimson.” He told her. After all, who could say no to those?

Crimson smirked at him and nodded in understanding of his defeat.

“Ughh, okay, okay.” Older Steven told his younger self. “Hmmm, I guess Smoky Quartz would be best then. We could use Sunstone and say it’s a pop quiz on safety since we just did that lesson not too long ago, but that wouldn’t keep everyone’s attention. Rainbow Quartz 2.0 is more one-on-one with people. So, yeah, I think Smoky Quartz would be the way to go.” He said, nodding his head in agreement with his conclusion.

“Aw, yeah!” Ame shouted running up to Older Steven.

“Even though it’s disappointing, it was the likeliest outcome that I saw…” Crimson said while Dewdrop shook her head in defeat.

Younger Steven was freaking out. He couldn’t wait to see what a fusion between him and Amethyst would look like. He was also just happy that he could do gem things. He had started to worry that he would never measure up or be helpful when it came to gem stuff. He hated being left behind because it was too dangerous for him to go with the gems during missions. He couldn’t wait to see what kind of fusion he made with the others too. It did kind of feel like cheating, but it must be okay if Garnet wasn’t against it. After all, he didn’t know what situation made it possible for him to form fusions with the gems.

Garnet watched on in interest. She had to admit, new fusions were her weakness. She couldn’t see anything wrong with allowing them all to see this fusion that would happen in the future either. Honestly, her future vision was still unclear on the consequences of them learning anything about their future here. It was something she was anxious to discuss with her future self later.

Amethyst looked excited to see a new fusion with herself. She had fun fusing with Garnet and she could bet fusing with Steven was more like fusing with Garnet than with Pearl. Somehow, Pearl was able to take all the fun and excitement out of fusing.

Pearl looked on with worry. While she was happy to see that fusion between all of them seemed more relaxed and casual, she worried about Steven; her Steven and the future Steven. She worried about something going wrong. When they first discussed teaching Steven how to fuse, she was against it. However, Garnet convinced her it would be safe and a good lesson for Steven. She had time to prepare herself, but now she was stuck only being able to watch what happened next. Even though neither Garnet or Crimson seemed worried, this wasn’t too reassuring since Garnet was always a fan of fusion and would probably need to see a really bad outcome to actually stop fusion from happening. She didn’t think that she would ever be able to stop worrying about Steven. She just wanted him to stay safe; she had to protect him. She had to, just like she protected Rose. Looking at her future self though, it seemed like she was able to control this urge better. Or at least hide it better. Her future self actually looked almost as excited as the rest of them.

Older Steven grinned at Ame, “Are you ready?” he said, holding out his hand.

“Heck ya!” Ame shouted, grabbing his hand.

They started to glow and then a second later a new figure stood in front of them.

“Hello, past peeps! Smoky Quartz at your service.” Smoky said, doing a dramatic bow for the past gems while the future gems watched in amusement. Crimson, in particular, watched her past self and waited for her reaction. She wasn’t disappointed.

Almost immediately Garnet started yelling, a wide smile on her face. She grabbed Amethyst and Younger Steven into a hug while still staring at their future fusion. “You too can fuse by just holding each other’s hands!?” she asked, finding it hard to contain her excitement.

Pearl just stood there observing the fusion. Her opinion wasn’t clear, but at least she wasn’t freaking out.

“Is that… good?” Younger Steven asked, feeling squished in Garnet’s hold.

“Oh jeesh, Garnet! Come on man!” Amethyst yelled out, trying to escape Garnet’s hug.

“It is! That’s extraordinary! It means you two have a close enough bond to not need to synchronize through dance.” Garnet explained, still overly excited at the display but she finally let them go when she noticed Younger Steven’s discomfort.

Smoky laughed at the reaction. “Hey, that remind you of anyone?” they asked Crimson, nudging her with their elbow.

“Yes, yes it does,” Crimson said, completely unashamed.

Dewdrop smiled and shook her head. She remembers the day they first met Smoky; it was a slight disaster but it turned out alright in the end.

Once Garnet calmed down, Bismuth, who had been a silent audience in all this, finally spoke up. “As fun as this has been… My next class will be here any moment.” She told them. Her feelings about all of this were still all over the place.

“Oh right! I’m here to provide a clean getaway for you guys right?” Smoky asked them.

“Yes, we’ll call Steven’s phone when we are safely away from Little Homeworld,” Crimson told Smoky.

“Ay, ay captain!” Smoky said saluting Crimson before they left the building. Soon the gems and Younger Steven heard them yelling out to all the gems to gather around for a special show.

“How are they going to distract the gems?” Pearl asked, worried for their safety.

“Their weapon is a Yo-Yo. It’s actually really effective in battle and rescue missions, and it can also be used for entertainment purposes too.” Dewdrop explained to the group.

“Cool! I wish I could have seen their weapon!” Younger Steven said, stars appearing in his eyes again.

Crimson and Dewdrop looked at each other and smiled. They forgot how easily impressed Steven used to be.

“Okay, let's head out. Stay close together and listen to me or Garnet for instructions.” Crimson said, ushering them all out the back and away from where Smoky’s performance was.  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, it turns out I have a hard time with nicknames XD. It's not my thing lol  
> I hope you enjoyed it anyway. It is a slow burn before the real excitement starts, but I promise it picks up soon! 
> 
> I'm still trying to come up with a name for Older Steven. So, if anyone has a really good nickname for our future boy, let me know! 
> 
> I really want to take inspiration from another time travel fic (of course after asking for permission from the author) and have Older Steven go by the name of Nora. I honestly really liked that in the other time travel fic and thought it was creative.  
> I do want to see if I can come up with something different and unique for my story first, but I keep going back to that name. I blame the other author's story! The name really stuck with me!


	3. All Things Rose

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my goodness, the writer's block for this chapter was ridiculous. The characters were not working with me XD. So, hopefully they weren't too out of character.  
> Sorry for the long wait. Between the writer's block and work I really struggled to get this chapter out in a timely manner. I'm hoping the next chapter will be a little easier (and come out faster for you all). There are some reveals I want to do that I am excited about :).
> 
> Thanks again to my beta DekuEAM. She patiently waited for me to finish the chapter and beta'ed it for me :)

Thankfully, they were able to make it to the beach house without any incidents. Smoky met back up with them after they were far enough away from Little Homeworld. After that, there were only a few humans and gems along the way that they needed to distract so the group could get by unnoticed. The group did have to sneak through parts of the woods to get back the house, but Older Steven made sure they stayed far away from Jasper’s area.

As the future group leads the gems and Younger Steven up to the house, Younger Steven stopped to stare at the sight before them. “Oh, wow! It was really hard to see from far away, but look at the house!” he exclaimed with stars in his eyes, excitedly bouncing up and down.

Pearl, Garnet, and Amethyst took a moment to really look at their home; it  _ had _ changed. The statue was the same, but the house looked bigger. There was a car parked below the house by the cliff, and there was a dome added by the house.

“What is the dome for?” Pearl asked. It reminded her of the dome on the moon, but that served the purpose of storing gem technology and being a home base for Pink Diamond. She doubted this one did the same.

“Eh, oh yeah… It’s used to help communicate with other gems…” Older Steven said awkwardly, looking towards the future gems for help.

“Everything will be explained shortly, let’s get into the house first,” Crimson told them, ushering them up the steps.

Garnet took a second, but she followed along. She wasn’t seeing something important which meant that there was information she needed to know in order to have an accurate vision. It was the one true flaw of Sapphires. If they were missing important information, then they couldn’t always get a completely accurate prediction of the future. She knew, looking far enough ahead, that they would all be safe in their current company. What concerned her was the sadness and anger that she saw in most of her visions.

Everyone made their way inside, the future gems standing behind Older Steven while he stood facing the past gems and Younger Steven who stood by the entrance.

Younger Steven looked around, taking in the differences. “Hey, wait! Where’s my bedroom?” he asked, horrified to see his bedroom gone.

Older Steven laughed, “Oh, it’s up the stairs. It’s more of an actual bedroom now. I have a balcony that leads to the dome too.” he told his younger self.

“Oh… That’s cool!” Younger Steven said, having to think for a moment if it was actually cool. He felt like it would be lonelier being upstairs in a room by himself. How would he know when the gems were home? Maybe that’s what his older self liked though? He knew from his experience with the cool kids and Lars that many older teens liked having their own space away from others. He kept looking around when something else caught his eye. “Hey! What happened to mom’s picture?” he asked Older Steven and the future gems.

The future gems suddenly looked very uncomfortable. The past gems looked up at the spot the picture usually rested and realized with a start that it was indeed gone. In fact, it couldn’t be hung from the same spot anymore due to the windows. They all looked around and couldn’t find the picture anywhere. Pearl did notice a spot by the stairs that looked as if a picture used to hang there due to the discoloration.

“Oh…” Older Steven started awkwardly, “Well, you see…” he said glancing at the future gems.

The gems just shrugged their shoulders and looked to him to explain the situation. They honestly didn’t understand the reason for Steven needing to find another place for the painting. They understood that he wanted to move on, but they didn’t understand how removing her portrait would help with that. They felt like they all had been able to move on from Rose’s actions a while ago.

Older Steven gave them a look that said ‘Gee, thanks’. “Um, well. It was hanging up on the wall by the stairs, but I decided to um…. Well, I put it away for now. To, uh… Protect it? No, more to just… help us move on. Ugh, this will be easier to explain after we figure out what to do from here.” He said, rubbing his temples with his fingers. He really tried to put it into words, but them not knowing very important details made it hard to explain without giving away things that he shouldn’t at the moment. Not to mention the fact that he had been trying very hard to not think about Rose lately.

“Oh, um… Okay.” Younger Steven said, looking at his older counterpart with concern. “Well, before we sit down to figure out what to do, can we come up with a nickname for you?” he asked, unsure now that Older Steven seemed frustrated.

“Huh, oh yeah. Sure.” Older Steven replied, completely forgetting that they never figured out a name for him to go by.

Pearl, Amethyst, and Garnet watched the interaction take place. Amethyst was already getting bored and trying to decide if she should mess with her future self or see if she could get into the temple. Her future self looked much too serious so she was leaning towards bugging herself.

Garnet was silently waiting for the moment they could discuss what to do next and if their past selves would affect their future selves.

Pearl wanted to intervene and move on but was beginning to learn that it wouldn’t work. All of them here in the future seemed to defer to Older Steven first. She was a little upset that Older Steven had taken down Rose’s portrait, it was to honor her and her sacrifices. It felt wrong for it to be removed and wondered why her future self had allowed that to happen.

“Hmm, okay. I’ve been thinking a lot about nicknames for you,” Younger Steven started. “What about RQ, that’s short for Rose Quartz, or just Quartz? Since we have our mom’s gem.” Something Younger Steven didn’t say out loud was that he thought the name fit because Older Steven seemed really cool just like his mom. It seemed like Older Steven lived up to all the expectations that the gems had for him when he was older. That was almost a relief for Steven since he constantly felt like he would never be good enough to be a real Crystal Gem.

“No.” Older Steven said quickly and then realized how rude that sounded. “I mean, RQ doesn’t really flow… if that makes sense.” He said internally wincing at how dumb that sounded. “Plus, Quartz just… doesn’t feel like me.”

“Ah, okay…” Younger Steven said, unsure about the strong reaction but maybe Older Steven just really didn’t like the name; he could understand that.

The future gems watched Older Steven closely. They could understand his aversion to the name Rose Quartz, or anything similar. Especially after meeting with the newly unbubbled Rose Quartz’s. That was an awkward experience for everyone. Even Amethyst who was able to avoid it for the most part.

“Okay then!” Younger Steven started again. “My next two ideas for nicknames both ended with quartz, but since you don’t like quartz we can take them off the end of the names. So, what about Star or Pink-?” he started to ask.

At the name Pink, Older Steven panicked and shouted, “No!” His face lit up pink. If it had stayed on his cheeks, the others could have assumed it was a weird blush but it didn’t. Older Steven’s hands clenched at his side as he forced himself to relax as the pink started to spread under his shirt. “H- W-“ he struggled to form words and took a deep breath, the pink receding back to just his cheeks. He forced a smile to his face that came out as more of a grimace, “I really don’t like that name. Sorry.” He said the words sounding strained.

“Are… you okay? I’m sorry if that was a bad one, but I thought it fit really well ‘cause our gem is pink… I’m sorry…” Younger Steven trailed off, feeling slightly hurt and frustrated this time. Why did it seem like every name he came up with was terrible? His future self had a bad reaction to almost all of them. Was it because of the connection to their mom? Did something happen with their mom that made his future self so angry? And what was that pink glow? Was it a new power? All these thoughts swirled around in Younger Steven’s head as he looked at his older self. He felt the tears threatening to fall from his eyes, but tried to hold back. He didn’t want to make this any worse than it already was.

Older Steven noticed his younger self’s reaction and wanted to hit himself. ‘ _ Gee, way to go and make your younger self cry Steven. Aren’t you supposed to help others?’  _ he thought to himself. He was still concentrating on making the pink completely disappear, which felt like it was harder to do when he wasn’t just shocked out of it. After a few seconds, he was finally able to make the pink go away as he struggled to control his feelings.

The older gems watched the situation carefully. Crimson was getting some very mixed visions and she could tell Garnet was as well. Dewdrop had seen this pink power in action and held herself still, watching with caution. She wasn’t quite sure how to feel about this new power but knew it could be destructive and that Steven needed to concentrate right now. She was ready to step in if she needed to though. Ame was just concerned. She had experienced the power in action as Smoky Quartz and it seemed like a really cool power to have. This was the first time she had seen it happen as a reaction to negative emotions.

Pearl watched this whole exchange take place and watched her Steven hold back tears. She felt anger building up inside her. All of this felt so wrong to her. Why were their older selves just standing back and letting this happen? How could her Steven, albeit older, yell at someone like that? It was just a name. Her Steven was always kind and was always aware of how others felt. How could this older version of Steven not have respect for what his mother did for them and him? How could he disrespect her by removing the portrait and reacting horribly to nicknames that represented him and his mother so well? She had a feeling that the truth had come out about Rose, but… that shouldn’t be the reason for him reacting this way. She always felt that Garnet would react terribly to the truth, but why would Steven? She just didn’t understand.

“What is wrong with you?” Pearl asked Older Steven, looking disappointed as she hugged his younger version. “The Steven I know would never talk to someone that way,” she told him, her voice getting louder with each sentence. “The Steven I know would be happy that someone came up with nicknames that represented him and his mother!” she shouted.

Older Steven had finally calmed down enough and was going to walk over to his younger self to comfort him when Pearl had started talking. “Wha…” Older Steven asked when she finished, “Wait a minute.” He said. He could almost feel the pink fighting to come back. This was not how he wanted the conversation to go. “I didn’t mean to-” he started, but a glare from Pearl stopped him mid-sentence.

Thankfully, Amethyst felt for Older Steven being yelled at by Pearl. She could tell Older Steven hadn’t meant to hurt his younger self. Plus, she was used to being the one getting yelled at by Pearl and knew how it felt. Although, she never thought she would live to see the day that Pearl yelled at Steven, older or not. If it was a less serious situation she would have sat back with popcorn.

“Hey Pearl, back off man. Obviously, crap went down and that name brings up bad memories. So much for being smart.” Amethyst told Pearl, trying to bait her into arguing with her instead of Older Steven.

Pearl turned to face Amethyst, “Excuse me!” she yelled at Amethyst and proceeded to berate her. Amethyst gave a small smirk and a thumbs up to Older Steven.

Older Steven could’ve hugged Amethyst. He wasn’t ready to deal with Pearl on a rampage. He had almost forgotten how easily angered she used to get. He glanced at Dewdrop and saw that she looked embarrassed about the whole thing.

“I am so sorry Steven.” She said quickly and went to help Amethyst deal with Pearl.

Ame went to go join her, “Eh, looks like good ol’ times to me.” She teased Dewdrop, who playfully shoved her.

Older Steven took a deep breath and glanced at his younger self. Younger Steven was standing by the arguing gems, going back and forth between looking at the argument taking place and Older Steven.

Older Steven gave a less forced smile towards his younger self and beckoned him away from the other gems.

“Hey, I’m sorry.” He started once Younger Steven nervously crept closer to him. “I really didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. It wasn’t anything you did, I promise. Once we come up with a nickname for me, we can figure out what to do next. I might be able to tell you why I don’t like those names too. Okay?” Older Steven told him, kneeling down so he could look his younger self in the face. And boy, was it weird that he had to bend down to be eye to eye with himself.

Younger Steven gave his older self a small smile. “Okay.” He said. “Um… I do have… one other name suggestion…” he started, a little nervous.

“Okay…” Older Steven said, “Go ahead, what is it?”

“Um, well. I kind of like the name Esteban.” Younger Steven started, a little unsure. However, when Older Steven started smiling, he continued excitedly. “I always thought I could use that as a codename if I ever went on a spy mission.”

Older Steven let out a laugh. “Oh wow, I forgot all about that name. You know what?”

“What!?” Younger Steven asked loudly, happy that his older self finally seemed happy too.

“I actually did use that as a codename to infiltrate an evil gem base,” he whispered to Younger Steven.

“What! No way!” Younger Steven said with stars in his eyes.

Older Steven smiled, finally feeling calm again. “Yep! Actually, that name made me think of the perfect nickname for myself. What about Stefan, but spelled S.T.E.P.H.E.N? It kind of sounds similar to the name Esteban, but it looks really similar to Steven. You can actually pronounce it as Steven or Stefan. So, obviously it would have to be pronounced Stefan or it wouldn’t really help as a nickname separate from Steven.” He told his younger self.

“That’s perfect…” Younger Steven said quietly, looking at his older self with glee.

“Stephen it is!” he said, standing up and turning to face the gems again.

While the two Stevens talked, Garnet and Crimson had stood silently watching the small battle that had broken out between the other four gems. When Steven and Stephen turned to look, Steven broke out laughing while Stephen shook his head.

“What is happening right now?” Stephen asked Crimson.

Crimson and Garnet smirked at each other. Crimson then turned to Stephen, “Let’s just say the argument got interesting” she told him. Both Garnets then moved in to separate the gems and get them under control.

Stephen finally let out a small laugh at how ridiculous the whole thing looked. He wasn’t sure how the serious argument had turned into a dog pile of Pearls and Amethysts, but it was amusing.

Once everyone was calm, the older gems moved back to Stephen while Steven went back to his gems.

“Oh, Steven! Are you alright?” Pearl asked him, a little ashamed that she had forgotten about him in the heat of the argument that turned into a fight.

“Huh? Oh, yeah. I’m fine” he said, smiling up at Pearl. “We made up.”

“Yep, now it’s time for us to move on. I have my nickname.” Stephen said. He then explained his nickname to the gems.

“Oh, that is an interesting nickname indeed.” Dewdrop said, smiling.

Crimson cut off any other talk, “Yes, it is and I think it fits him.” She said, smiling at Stephen. “However, I think it’s finally time to move on and get to the big discussion.” She said.

“Finally!” Pearl shouted, happy to get something accomplished at last. Everyone turned to look at her and she blushed. She hadn’t realized how loud that had been.

Stephen cleared his throat, “Okay. So, let's get comfortable.” He said and motioned for the past gems and Steven to sit in the living room first. “Ame, would you happen to have a good couch or something in your room for us to use? If not we could use the chairs from the dining room.”

“Eh, I think I have something in good condition we could use. Hold on.” She said and disappeared into her room in the temple.

The future gems and Stephen waited as the others got comfortable.

Ame came back, pushing a long couch out of her room. Stephen went and helped her set it up across from the other gems. This left a coffee table in the middle in case they needed it for something.

The future gems and Stephen then got comfortable. After that, both parties sat there in awkward silence for a moment. 

Crimson decided to be the first to break the silence. “I think first we need to discuss if our past selves being here will affect the future,” she said. 

“I agree,” Garnet responded. “Do any of you have any memories of going to the future?”

“I don’t,” Stephen said and the future gems agreed with him. 

“How did you end up in the future?” Crimson asked.

“Well, we went to find the Legendary Glass of Time and Amethyst was messing around and broke some of the timepieces. One of them must have been the correct one because we ended up here.” Pearl said, glaring at Amethyst. 

“Oh jeesh. Here we go again.” Amethyst grumbled, rolling her eyes.

Pearl went to yell at her, but Garnet stopped her. “I’m guessing that’s not what happened for you all?” Garnet asked the future group.

“No, actually Ame grabbed the wrong one but she didn’t break any. When the room started to flood, I grabbed the one I had been looking at. It ended up being the real one, but it only let me travel a few hours.” Stephen told the group. Then he realized something, “Wow, you guys are pretty far back from the past. I haven’t even turned 14 yet.”

“That’s true, but we can talk about that later,” Crimson stated, trying to keep the conversation on track. “So, instead of Stephen messing with the time stream-”

“It wasn’t fun.” Stephen added.

Crimson stared at Stephen for a moment, making him smile awkwardly before apologizing. “Anyway…” she started again. “Instead of that happening, Amethyst broke the right timepiece and that caused you all to travel into the future. Which means we have a divergent time stream happening. What happened to cause our future, will not happen for you. Your future has already been changed by coming here, but it hasn’t affected ours. That leads me to believe that anything you witness here will only change your future, but not ours. Do you agree, Garnet?”

“Yes, that seems to be correct,” Garnet stated. “This means we could be allowed to learn of the future and use that to make our future better. Of course, we could always end up making our future worse too. Friends you made here could become our enemies if we mess something up.”

Steven sat there, looking worried. “That doesn’t sound good…” he said.

Stephen looked at his family and looked at Steven and the past gems. “Well, maybe if we tell them all the things that have happened they could make better choices and have better outcomes?” he asked. “Kind of like Garnet’s future vision that gives her different outcomes. We could give them the path we took and they could decide what is important enough to keep and what should be changed.” He told them all. He liked the idea of being able to help his past self. Maybe he could help this Steven turn out better than him. Maybe this younger version of himself could end up happier than him. He had already convinced himself to help his past self as much as possible after he made Steven cry. 

Garnet and Crimson looked at each other, not finding any fault with Stephen’s reasoning. 

“Well, it is obvious that we don’t know some important information. I can see outcomes but not what is causing those outcomes.” Garnet told Stephen and the future gems. 

Stephen looked at his family. He was sure the information Garnet was missing was the true identity of his mother. “Do we want to start with… you know… that?” he asked the future gems.

The future gems looked at each other and nodded back at him. 

“That will help explain a lot and make things easier to talk about.” Dewdrop said, looking at her past self. 

Pearl had an idea of what they were talking about and it made her nervous. She caught Dewdrop looking at her and relaxed a bit when Dewdrop sent her a smile. Obviously, things worked out if they were all still together, but she worried about Garnet hating her. Her future self’s reassurance helped though. 

“I’ll take Garnet,” Crimson said and stood up. She beckoned Garnet to follow her into her room. “It’s the best way to do this,” she added before they disappeared into the temple.

Stephen, Dewdrop, and Ame all breathed sighs of relief after they disappeared. Garnet had taken the truth the hardest due to the nature of the secret. Crimson was definitely the best one to handle her past self’s reaction to the truth. 

“Alright then…” Dewdrop started but trailed off. She wasn’t exactly sure how to handle this. 

“Rose lied to us,” Stephen said bluntly to the past gems. 

“Stev- Stephen!” Dewdrop yelled, surprised by his bluntness.

“What? It’s the truth. She lied to us. She wasn’t who she said she was.” Stephen said.

“What do you mean?” Steven asked. He didn’t like to think that his mom was a liar. That didn’t line up with what everyone always said about his mom. The gems always told him how his mom was brave and cared about others. You didn’t lie to those you cared about… did you?

Pearl clutched at her outfit. Unless she wanted to have her hands over her mouth during this whole conversation, she would have to wait until Rose’s identity was revealed. Even though she wanted to scold Stephen for how he was handling it. Yes, Rose lied, but that didn’t make her a bad person!

Amethyst looked intrigued by the way this conversation was going. What did Stephen mean by saying Rose wasn’t who she said she was? Who was she then?

Stephen looked at all their reactions and sighed. He tried to pull back on how abrupt and rude he was acting by taking a calming breath. It was just a sore subject after everything he was still learning about Rose. He was still discovering more lies and other people she had harmed. He hated finding out more things he had to fix or clean up because of her. He liked being needed, but he was tired of dealing with her past. He was tired of feeling like he needed to fix her mistakes because he had her gem. 

He took a deep breath. “Rose was Pink Diamond.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I got to the end, I decided that was the perfect place to stop and do something similar to what happened in the actual series. Sorry, not sorry XD  
> The next chapter should be a little light and humorous (at least at the beginning) since Steven has no clue about the diamonds and even Amethyst only has a vague understanding.  
> Also, I hope I spelled Stephen consistently throughout this chapter XD... I kept going back and forth between spelling it Stephen and Stephan. I liked Stephen though because someone I know spells their name like that but it's pronounced like Stefan.


	4. Pink Diamond

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is chapter four, guys! I hope you enjoy it :)
> 
> Somewhat of a spoiler for the In Dreams episode of SUF below.
> 
> Just have to say that I feel like Stephen as a nickname for Future Steven has been validated by the show XD. There was the World's Best Stephen mug (which has probably been there for a while, but I just noticed it) and then the fact that Steven basically made an OC character based off himself and then named the character Stefan. So, not same spelling but close enough!
> 
> I have a tumblr now too for this story if you are interested in updates. I'll try to add updates on there when I'm working on new chapters. Plus, you can ask questions too lol.  
> [pastmeetfuturesu](https://pastmeetfuturesu.tumblr.com/)

Stephen looked at Amethyst and Steven, waiting for their reaction. However, all that followed his big reveal was silence.

Finally, Steven spoke up. “Um… Who?” he asked. He didn’t want to sound stupid but he had no clue who that was. It was obviously a different gem from the one his mom claimed to be. Was his mom someone super important or something? Why did she pretend to be a Quartz if she wasn’t one?

“Wasn’t that, like, one of the leaders that Rose and the rest of the Crystal Gems fought against or something?” Amethyst asked, looking interested. The others never really talked about the war much. They gave her vague details about how bad the Homeworld gems were and how their leaders, the Diamonds, were terrible monsters. How could Rose be Pink Diamond? Rose and Garnet both talked smack about her all the time. Although, Garnet’s rants about Blue Diamond when she first joined them were even more epic.

Stephen looked at Amethyst and Steven in confusion before he groaned. “Ugh, I forgot how far back in the past you guys are. Of course, Steven doesn’t know who I’m talking about,” he started. He turned to Ame, “I thought you knew about the Diamonds though?” He asked her.

Ame shrugged. “I knew a little bit about them. Of course, I heard their rants about the Diamonds and how they destroyed worlds and shattered gems for not being perfect. I didn’t really learn a lot about the war until you did too. They didn’t like to talk a whole bunch about it.”

“Yeah, what older me said,” Amethyst said, shrugging. “That’s pretty much all I know right now.”

“Wait, wait, wait!” Steven interrupted the conversation. “Okay, it sounds like these diamonds aren’t good people. Are you saying mom isn’t a good person if she was Pink Diamond?” He asked. While his face didn’t show it yet, his voice gave away how upset he was. The gems always talked about how good mom was and how caring she was. How could she be that and also be this mean, evil Diamond too? He looked around at his family, his future self, and the future gems. The silence was deafening.

Stephen adjusted himself in his seat while looking uncomfortable. Both Amethysts looked to their Pearls for an answer. Amethyst was just as confused as Steven while Ame wasn’t even sure how to approach the subject since Dewdrop handled it last time.

When the silence continued, Dewdrop decided to answer Steven’s question. Knowing what she did now, it wasn’t an easy yes or no answer like she thought it had been back then. However, she paused when she saw Pearl take a deep breath and turn to Steven. She knew her past self would answer similarly to how she first answered questions about Rose’s past. Maybe it would be okay to think of it as an easy yes or no answer for now.

Pearl sat there frozen. This wasn’t quite how she envisioned this talk going. Of course, she wasn’t sure if it would ever be a talk that she could have with anyone. However, now that Rose’s identity had been revealed Pearl could finally talk about it. Rose’s last order to her was no longer valid. There was no way she would sit back and let Steven think his mom was a horrible person; that Rose was a horrible person. She took a deep breath and turned to Steven. “Oh, no. No Steven. She wasn’t a bad person at all.” She said, comforting Steven and running a hand through his hair to get his attention.

Steven turned to look at her.

Stephen wanted to say something about what Pearl just said, but held himself back. He didn’t need to upset his past self even more at the moment. He glanced at Dewdrop who gave him a strained smile when she noticed him looking at her.

Dewdrop still stood by the fact that Rose wasn’t a bad person, but she had to admit that Rose did make some awful mistakes throughout her life. This was made more obvious to her after finding out the truth about Volley’s eye. It took her a long time to realize how much Rose had hurt her too.

“Rose, well…. Rose was a Diamond. That’s true. It’s also true that she came to Earth to use it to make more gems and that meant the Earth would be destroyed. Planets like the Earth were called colonies.” She started. She noticed Steven’s eyes go wide and he looked like he was about to question her; before he could she cut him off. “BUT! She came to Earth and saw its beauty and all the life growing on it. She realized that the colonization of Earth would destroy all of this and she decided to  _ protect _ Earth instead.” She told Steven.

Although the explanation was directed at Steven, Amethyst listened closely as well.

“But, why did mom have to change who she was then? Why didn’t she just stay as a diamond and tell the other diamonds she wasn’t going to destroy the Earth?” Steven asked. “Also… how many diamonds are there?”

“There were four diamonds including your mom, Pink Diamond. The other three were Yellow Diamond, Blue Diamond, and White Diamond.” Dewdrop spoke up. “Pearl, it might be easier if you showed them,” she said gesturing to Pearl’s gem.

Dewdrop instantly felt guilty when Pearl’s eyes went wide and she looked panicked. Of course, Pearl wouldn’t be ready to do something like that. She hadn’t grown or developed the strength necessary to talk about all this. It took all of the trials and encounters with Homeworld gems for her to gather the strength to show Steven the truth. It had still been hard back then to show Steven and Sapphire what had happened with her and Rose.

Dewdrop backtracked, “Or if you would like, I can show them our story with Rose?” Dewdrop asked Pearl.

Pearl calmed down and gave her future self a look of gratitude. It would be easier to show it, but the thought of doing so herself made her panic. She started to reply to Dewdrop’s question when she was interrupted by Amethyst.

“Wait, before Pearl answers that.” Amethyst started as she turned to face Pearl. “Why didn’t you tell us about this sooner? Why didn’t Rose tell us the truth?” She asked her. Amethyst could feel herself getting angry. All her life, she was told that her birthplace was a mistake that should have never happened. That her existence helped ruin part of the Earth. All of them wanted to forget that the Kindergartens even existed at all. Now, she was told that the Diamond who came to colonize this planet and  **made** the kindergartens is the same gem that told them all how bad the kindergartens are. Why would she do that?

“Well- ah, it’s complicated…” Pearl stuttered, trying to come up with the words to explain it. She wasn’t sure why Amethyst was getting so angry.

Ame noticed Pearl’s struggle and butted into the conversation. “Dewdrop will explain that with the light show she’s about to put on. Pearl has a good reason why she couldn’t say anything. Rose on the other hand… I dunno. I guess she didn’t want to say anything during the war because it might turn gems against her or have others join just because she was a diamond. After the war… maybe she felt guilty about what happened to all the gems and she was worried we would hate her?” Ame shrugged and looked at Dewdrop for help.

Before Dewdrop could say anything, Amethyst exploded at her future self, “How can you be so calm about all of this! After how they made us feel!” Amethyst started, but was stopped by Ame.

“Dude, I wasn’t calm at first. I was just as mad as you are right now. Well, maybe not this mad. Me and Pearl already talked out some stuff before I found all this out.” Ame said. “I can guess that you are feeling betrayed because of the kindergarten, right?”

Amethyst sunk down into the couch and nodded, doing her best not to cry but tears streamed down her face anyway. She wiped away the tears as they fell.

“Wait, what?” Pearl asked, startled. She looked at the future gems and then at Amethyst. “Why… Amethyst… Why are you upset about  _ that _ ?” she asked her, completely caught off guard.

“Why!” Amethyst asked, sitting back up and staring at Pearl in anger and disbelief. “Oh, I dunno…” She said sarcastically. “Maybe because you guys never want to talk about the place I was made and act like it’s some dirty secret!”

Steven sat in the middle of the two with wide eyes. He hadn’t expected to be stuck in the middle of their argument. He slid down and off the couch when Amethyst started shouting at Pearl. He stood up and looked at them for a moment as the argument got heated. He hated it when they fought and he didn’t know what to do. Before he could get really upset, Stephen got his attention and patted the spot next to him. Steven wanted to refuse because he was more concerned about stopping the fight. However, Stephen shook his head and gestured to the spot again. Steven looked back at the two gems and sighed; he came and sat down.

“Don’t worry,” Stephen whispered, “They really need to have this conversation. When it happened with me, it took them physically fighting in the kindergarten before I could convince Pearl to talk to Amethyst.” He told Steven. He watched for a moment as Dewdrop and Ame got up to go over to their past selves.

Steven looked at his future self in shock. “Whaaaaa….” He exclaimed, glancing over at the gems. “Are they… will they be okay?” He asked Stephen, nervous and uncomfortable. Then Steven realized something, “Wait, what’s a kindergarten? Isn’t that an Earth thing?”

Stephen laughed and shook his head. “They will be fine. A kindergarten is what the gems call the place where other gems are made. It’s where gems are born basically.” Stephen would have continued the explanation, but the voices quieted down. He looked over at Amethyst and Pearl who were now standing and facing each other. Amethyst still looked upset; her arms crossed as if holding herself. Pearl was staring at her with a sad look as she gripped the bow on her waist. Ame and Dewdrop were standing behind their past selves, it looked like they were able to keep the two from physically fighting.

“Amethyst…” Pearl started, “I don’t think you are a mistake, you’re just the byproduct of … a big mistake” Pearl trailed off, blushing when she realized how that sounded.

Amethyst glared at her and looked down. Her arms falling at her side while her hands became fists.

Ame and Dewdrop looked at each other with knowing looks. Not quite the same, but close to their conversation that day.

“Ugh, no! That’s not- I…. I just never connected that place with you. You didn’t build that place! You didn’t have any control over how you were made! I- I’m sorry, Amethyst…” Pearl continued, still blushing. She turned away from Amethyst and shifted in place, looking uncomfortable.

Amethyst looked up in shock, her fists relaxing. She looked back down again when Pearl’s eyes glanced back over at her.

“I hope you can forgive me… You are the one good thing that came out of that place.” Pearl continued, tears pooling around her eyes but not quite falling. “I always thought you were proud of that…” she ended. She shifted nervously as she watched Amethyst, not quite sure what to do next.

Amethyst’s hair blocked her face so Pearl couldn’t see what she was thinking. Amethyst pushed her hair back and folded her arms again. She looked like she was thinking over Pearl’s words and hesitating about something. This lasted for almost a minute before she ran at Pearl and hugged her.

Pearl jumped when Amethyst first moved at her, but then her blush returned when she realized she was being hugged by her. She reached around to hug Amethyst back, blinking the tears from her eyes.

Ame and Dewdrop smiled, looking a little teary-eyed themselves. Ame sniffed and wiped her eyes, “Okay! Enough of the sap. Let’s sit back down.” She said with a smile.

Pearl and Amethyst jumped and stood back from each other. They had forgotten about their audience.

Steven was looking at them with stars, and tears, in his eyes.

Stephen looked happy with how it all turned out, and when he looked at Ame and Dewdrop they looked happy too. It was different from how he experienced it with the gems, but Stephen thought it turned out better for everyone this way. For one, Steven wasn’t put in danger and he didn’t have to force the two to talk it out. That… that had been hard for him back then.

Pearl and Amethyst sat back down on the couch from before, a little embarrassed at their display. Ame and Dewdrop sat back down on the other couch, leaving both Stevens in the middle. Steven glanced up at Stephen and Stephen nodded at him. This was all Steven needed as he stood up and ran to Amethyst and Pearl, grabbing them both in a hug that had all three of them laughing.

Dewdrop cleared her throat, “Okay, I’m ready to tell our story if you are Pearl.”

The two past gems and Steven settled on the couch. All of them in better moods after all that drama.

Pearl took a deep breath, “I’m ready.”

Dewdrop looked at Pearl. “Before I begin, I want to explain something about gems to Steven and Amethyst.”

Pearl had a feeling about what it was and nodded her head towards Dewdrop.

Dewdrop gave her a smile and turned to look at Steven and Amethyst, “Gems are made in kindergartens; they aren’t born and they don’t grow or change. When a gem is born, they know everything they could possibly ever need to know. They know where they stand in Homeworld’s hierarchy. Amethyst already knows some of this.” she said and tipped her head towards Amethyst who nodded at her.

It was one thing that was explained to Amethyst by Rose. However, Rose had told her that she didn’t need to worry about any of that because here on Earth she could decide what she wanted to be.

Dewdrop continued, “The hierarchy is something that needs to be explained so you can better understand our story. The diamonds are on top; they are in charge of the rest of the gems and their word is the law. There are upper-crust gems or upper-class gems like Emeralds; they are high-ranking gems. Sapphires are also upper-class and they are a part of the aristocratic elites. Agates are also higher ranking, but they are closer to an administrative role. They are usually put in charge of other gems or sometimes they are bodyguards for others. Amethysts, Quartzes, and Jaspers are soldiers or guards for Homeworld; an Agate is usually put in charge of a large group of these gems to keep them in order. Rubies are closer to the bottom of the hierarchy; they are used as guards or soldiers but are seen as expendable. Finally, at the very bottom are Pearls… we are made to be servants to other gems and are usually not even viewed as gems but as property to other gems.” She finished off her explanation with a sad smile.

Even though things were different now in the future, this was still a truth for Pearl. Where they came from in the past, Pearls are still seen as property.

Steven had listened closely to Dewdrop’s explanation of gems. Dewdrop used some complicated words that he didn’t completely understand but he could still figure out what she was trying to say. He didn’t know there were so many different kinds of gems or that there was more than one of each! Does that mean there are hundreds of Amethysts, Pearls, and Garnets? However, his eyes widened in shock and anger when Dewdrop explained where Pearls ranked.

“What! That’s not fair though! Pearl is amazing! Why would gems do that? No one should be forced to serve someone!” Steven yelled out, frustrated and upset.

Amethyst also looked upset at the explanation. She too had found the explanation interesting until Dewdrop got to the end. She never really knew a lot about how gems were supposed to function and no one ever wanted to talk about it. Usually, she wasn’t one to listen to lectures, but she wanted to know more about the planet she came from too.

Pearl gave Steven a reassuring smile as she ran a hand through his hair. “It wasn’t something that anyone ever gave thought to. As Dewdrop said, we came out knowing what we were supposed to be. Why would anyone question it? That was how we lived for a long time before Rose came along and changed everything.”

Steven looked up at Pearl from where he sat, he was still upset but nodded his head in understanding.

Dewdrop smiled at the past gems and Steven. She was about to begin the story when Stephen spoke up.

“Wait! Do you think… Garnet should be here?” he asked. He had gotten so distracted with listening to the conversation that he completely forgot about Garnet and Crimson.

“Hmm…” Dewdrop thought it over. “I really don’t want to interrupt them if Garnet’s reaction is as extreme as last time. Maybe… we could sit here for a moment. If Crimson comes out with Garnet then she thinks Garnet should hear this. If she doesn’t then we move on. Her future vision is working now after all.”

“Why  _ did _ Garnet have to leave with Crimson?” Steven asked. It was a question that had been on his mind when Crimson took Garnet into their room earlier.

“Oh, well when it was revealed that Rose was Pink Diamond in our time, Crimson had a hard time with it. Since Crimson knows how Garnet is going to react, she wanted to do it in a safe place where Garnet can take in the truth and hopefully won’t run away.” Stephen told Steven. He had to think of how to phrase it since Steven still didn’t know the truth about Garnet yet.

“What! Why would Garnet run away from us? Will she be mad because of who my mom is?... Who I am?” Steven asked, almost whispering the last part.

“What- Oh no, Steven she would never be angry at you… But… well, she does get mad at Rose for hiding who she was.” Dewdrop told him, playing with the hem of her jacket.

“Garnet hates the Diamonds. To her, they were everything wrong with Homeworld. They were cruel and hateful. They shattered other gems because they were different. There is a story behind her feelings towards the diamonds, but that is her story to tell.” Ame added in. “It took her a few days to understand Rose’s choice and why she did it.”

“Well, that makes sense since Garnet always ranted about the diamonds when I first joined them. Actually, she and Rose would tell me about some of their battles to free the Earth from the diamonds. Kinda messed up knowing that Rose was technically talking about herself too.” Amethyst told them all.

“Oh, okay…” Steven said, feeling a little relieved. He was glad that Garnet wouldn’t be angry at him. He looked up to Garnet, and she was so cool.

After the conversation finished, they all sat there for a moment. It was actually good to have a short break. Stephen finally got up to make him and Steven a snack. Steven ended up following him a second later because he wanted to see how cool the kitchen was now. After the two boys came back with refreshments and snacks, they all glanced at the temple door. It didn’t budge.

Dewdrop nodded to herself, “Well, I think that’s our cue to move on.”

“Now that you have some background, I can start the story.” She said as her pearl lit up. “I was given to Pink Diamond after her previous Pearl was… injured.” She started and winced at her mention of Volley. It was still hard to think about sometimes.

Pearl looked at Dewdrop in confusion. She knew there had been a Pearl before her, but she had been told that the previous Pearl was unfit to serve a diamond…

Dewdrop’s pearl created a hologram of a young Pearl meeting Pink for the first time. “Pink was the youngest diamond and so she didn’t have a colony of her own yet. I knew she was impatient for one and did my best to serve her while she worked on convincing the others that she was ready. Then, one day, she finally got her wish. She was granted her first colony…”

Dewdrop proceeded to show the past gems and Steven the story of how Rose came to be and all of the things they accomplished with their rebellion. She showed them how Garnet changed everything that they were fighting for. That after that, they wanted to fight for other gems who didn’t fit into Homeworld’s vision of perfection. She explained how, as Pink Diamond, Rose continued to try and reason with the diamonds to allow her to leave the Earth as is, but they refused and didn’t take her seriously. She showed them how they planned to shatter Pink Diamond so Rose could just be Rose. The past gems got to see how Pink Diamond gave her last order to Pearl: “ _ Let’s never speak of this again _ .” She explained how many times she thought about telling Garnet and Amethyst after Rose gave up her form, but how she couldn’t. She wasn’t able to find a way to reveal the secret until she acquired a cell phone. Stephen began to speak up about his point of view; about the day he found out the truth.

Amethyst and Steven listened closely to Dewdrop’s story. Their reactions changed throughout the story and questions were blurted out to get more details. Sometimes Pearl would hesitantly answer questions, but the answering was mostly done by Dewdrop and Stephen. After hearing about how Stephen found out the truth, Steven was just glad he didn’t have to go through Pearl’s old war memories and traumas to get to the truth.

Ame sat back and listened to the other two’s explanation. She was remembering how she acted towards the gems and Steven after that revelation. It had been a lot to process and she wasn’t even as close to the situation as the others were. Steven didn’t live through it all either, but even he had more to process since it had been his own mother. She almost laughed as she remembered how she tried to cheer him up and get him to talk. It had been the day she was deemed the most mature gem by Steven.

After they were finished, Dewdrop’s pearl dimmed until it was back to normal. They had stopped at the part where Stephen accidentally revealed the truth to Garnet and Amethyst. Both Dewdrop and Stephen had to stop themselves there. They almost continued and told Steven about Garnet. They didn’t want to be the ones to reveal Garnet as a fusion since that was her secret to share..

“Wow…,” Amethyst said, turning around on the couch so her head was hanging off the edge with her legs in the air, resting on the back of the couch.

“That’s… a lot.” Steven continued when it was clear Amethyst had nothing else to add.

Stephen nodded, “Yeah, it was a lot to take in when I found out. The circumstances were a bit different too. There are still some things you don’t know and things you haven’t experienced. Which is good because a lot of it sucked.”

“Language!” Pearl scolded Stephen.

Amethyst and Ame snorted while Stephen rolled his eyes.

Dewdrop hid a smile.

Pearl looked at everyone’s reactions and huffed. Obviously, no one was going to support her on this one.

Steven let out a small laugh at the scene and quickly turned away when Pearl narrowed her eyes at him. 

Now that the big reveal was done, everyone started to become restless for the two Garnets to join up with them again.

The future gems and Stephen wondered how Garnet was taking it this time and if Crimson was alright handling this on her own.

“Maybe… I should go check on them and help out…” Dewdrop spoke up unsurely.

Just as she stood to go approach the door, it opened. Crimson and Garnet both walked out looking the same as always.

Everyone got up and stood in front of the two couches, still split up between past and future selves.

“So… how’d it go?” Ame asked them.

Neither of them answered Ame. Instead Garnet walked up to Steven while Crimson walked over to Ame, Dewdrop, and Stephen.

Steven grew nervous as Garnet walked closer. “You don’t hate me, do you?!” he finally blurted out, not able to stand the silence as Garnet stopped in front of him. He knew they said Garnet wouldn’t hate him, but what if things had changed and  _ his  _ Garnet did hate him?

Garnet let out a small surprised laugh. “Steven… I could never hate you. I do have something I need to show you though.”

Steven smiled, relieved. He wondered if this had anything to do with what the others wouldn’t tell him about Garnet.

Garnet looked at Steven and gave him a smile. She was excited to show him this now that he could better understand what it means to her and the others. She had really wanted to wait until his birthday, but according to Crimson that hadn’t worked out at all. She would rather be able to tell Steven on her own terms. Garnet closed her eyes and unfused.

Steven watched with wide eyes as Garnet glowed white, similar to when two of the gems fused or unfused. In a flash, Garnet’s outline changed and left two smaller gems standing where Garnet once was.

“Whaaaaaaa-!” Steven yelled out, his hands squishing his face as stars appeared in his eyes. He stared at the two gems, “Garnet is a fusion?”

Sapphire giggled while Ruby looked at Steven with a proud smirk on her face.

“Yep! Me and Sapphy make up Garnet!” Ruby explained to Steven.

“We wanted to show you this on your birthday as part of your birthday present. However, after talking with Crimson we decided it would be better to show you now.” Sapphire calmly explained. “My name is Sapphire and this, “she said pointing to Ruby, “is Ruby. Our love is what keeps us together as Garnet.”

“This is  _ so cool _ !” Steven shouted, jumping up to greet the two gems. He awkwardly introduced himself even though they already knew who he was. The two of them laughed and indulged Steven. He couldn’t think of anything else to say that wouldn’t embarrass himself as he stood in front of them. “Aw man, I hope I’m making a good first impression,” Steven worried, rubbing the back of his neck.

Stephen couldn’t hold back a laugh at that sentence. It reminded him of when he first realized Garnet was a fusion. Same conversation, different place.

The two of them looked at each other and then looked back at Steven.

“Of course, you did. We already love you, Steven.” Sapphire told him fondly.

“Yeah! Even though you only knew Garnet, we have both been here together, watching over you.” Ruby said, smiling.

Sapphire looked over at Ruby and grabbed her hands, “That was beautiful Ruby!”

“Aw, I picked it up from you.  _ You  _ are beautiful.” Ruby said, flirting with Sapphire.

“Oh, stop it!” Sapphire said, giggling as she wrapped her arms around Ruby.

“Ahem,” Pearl cleared her throat, blushing.

Everyone else in the room was looking away and trying not to listen in to their conversation. The only exception being Crimson who was smiling widely.

Sapphire and Ruby stopped and looked around. “Ah, I think we are embarrassing them,” Sapphire said laughing.

“Shall we?” Ruby asked, holding her arms out.

“Lets,” Sapphire responded, smiling back at her as she jumped into Ruby’s arms.

Ruby picked Sapphire up and spun her around. The two of them laughing in joy before a bright light reappeared and, in their place, stood Garnet again, hugging herself and smiling.

“Whoa…” Steven whispered, the stars in his eyes reappearing.

The rest of the gems and Stephen could agree with that sentiment. It was always wonderful to see two gems in love fuse to become something more.

Garnet smiled down at Steven and then looked over at Crimson, who nodded back at her.

“Why don’t we all get comfortable again,” Garnet told everyone, “We have a few things we need to talk about.”

Everyone agreed and so they settled down once more on the couches.

“I’m really surprised to see you two together so quickly. I’m guessing that Crimson was able to convince you to stay together?” Dewdrop asked Garnet.

Garnet nodded, “She did help. She is me after all and knew exactly what our worries were. She was able to explain how she felt and she explained what took place for her after she found out the truth.” She explained to them. What she didn’t say to them was how hard it was at first. When she first split apart and the two gems raged against what they had just learned. It took Crimson unfusing so her components could talk to Garnet’s components and calm them down.

“We also didn’t really have a place to go to if we wanted to run away and sulk. It wouldn’t have been fair to Steven either since he didn’t even know that I am made of two gems. There were different factors in play from what Crimson dealt with at the time. I think Crimson convincing us of our love for each other helped. She told us about her wedding.” Garnet said smiling.

Garnet was looking forward to hers. It would be a while, but in the meantime, Crimson explained that they could be ‘engaged’. This meant that they still promised themselves to each other with an agreement to celebrate and make it official at a later date. Crimson said she took an interest in weddings after she had her own. Stephen, at the time, had wholeheartedly agreed to teach Crimson all about weddings and engagements. Garnet looked forward to having that connection with her Steven later.

Steven’s eyes went wide and he gasped. He turned to Crimson, “You got married?!” he asked her. “Oh, please tell me we used my book!”

Crimson laughed, “I did, and you planned it all with the help of your book.”

Steven looked about ready to pass out from joy and excitement as he turned to Garnet, his eyes pleading with her.

Garnet laughed, “Of course we will still use your book to plan our wedding. I already have plans to work with you and set it up when we get back to our time.” Garnet told him. She tried not to think about how or when they would actually get back to their time. It was still unclear in her future vision and Crimson’s visions were the same.

Steven squealed with joy as he bounced up and down in his seat.

Everyone enjoyed this moment of peace. It was nice to see everyone happy for once after all the stress of everything that happened today.

After Steven calmed down, he looked around at everyone. “Um, so… What do we do now?”

“Actually, I have another question,” Amethyst started, “So, like, we know Rose was Pink Diamond which means Stephen and Steven are too. So, how did you guys go from finding this out to building that city?” Amethyst asked. “There were so many different gems! Some even looked kinda corrupted too.”

The future gems and Stephen looked at each other. How should they explain this?

Just as Stephen was trying to think of a way to explain, there was a knock on the door.

“Oh thank- I mean, I wonder who that is?” Stephen asked, blushing as he rushed to get the door. Even though everything was good with the diamonds, he wasn’t looking forward to explaining how that all worked out. Plus, even if the past gems are good with knowing the truth about Pink Diamond, he wasn’t sure how they would take knowing that they worked with Homeworld and the Diamonds to help all gems.

At the last moment, he realized they never did anything to block out the windows to make sure the past gems couldn’t be seen. He almost panicked until he realized that the couch the past gems are on is blocked by the staircase. So, no one from outside could see them unless they went to another side of the house. Stephen breathed out a sigh of relief as he came close to the door and really looked out the window.

He almost came to a stop when he saw who it was and he quickly started to come up with plans in his head. He turned his head back to look at the future gems who also had slightly panicked looks on their faces. Ame especially looked shocked and looked back at Stephen in disbelief. The future gems stood up to better shield the past gems and Steven from being seen. They really hadn’t talked about it yet, but even without talking to each other they all knew there were encounters they wanted to plan out and they wanted to control what information they give to their past selves. This was one encounter they never anticipated.

With plans set in his head, Stephen took a deep breath as he came up to the door and opened it.

“We-well, heh. This is… a surprise?” Stephen started and then trailed off. He cleared his throat and tried again. “What I mean to say is… I never thought I would see you come here… Jasper.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, not sorry for the cliffhanger XD.  
> So, Jasper was not who I planned on showing up. The story kind of took over and decided for me. It's gonna be good though!
> 
> Also, yes, some lines within this chapter might sound very familiar. I did use some lines from the show because I felt like they still fit in my story. Plus, I thought it would be nice to show that some things will still remain the same even if it's just certain conversations with each other.


	5. Family Secrets

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jasper makes a short camo! Probably not for the last time :) What are the chances that Jasper (one of the best quartz soldiers) didn't see the past gems? 
> 
> I almost forgot to thank my awesome beta DekuEAM :). She is still looking over each of my chapters for me. Don't know what I would do without her!
> 
> Also, I caught the newest episode, Homeworld Bound, on the app. Really wish I would've waited so I could have watched it all at once. That episode f'ed me up real bad. Wtf is Steven doing???  
> It might take me a little bit to upload the next chapter after this one depending on how the last three episodes go on Friday. I just really hope it doesn't feel rushed..

Jasper looked down at Stephen and rolled her eyes. “Don’t get used to it.” She said roughly. “The only reason I’m here is because you earned  _ some _ respect from that fight before.” She continued, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Um… okay?” Stephen said, still confused.

Ame and Dewdrop looked at each other in confusion, wondering what fight Jasper was talking about. They looked at Crimson, but she only shook her head. She was too busy focusing on the conversation and making sure the past gems and Steven remained out of sight.

Jasper grunted in annoyance. “Here.” She said, grabbing something from out of sight and throwing it to Stephen.

Stephen caught the bundle and gasped, “Onion!” The boy in question was tied up with a fraying piece of rope, staring at Stephen with his usual emotionless look.

“What-” Stephen started, upset.

“I’m going to stop you there,” Jasper started, holding out a hand to stop him from continuing. “I found this… pale and weirdly shaped Earthling trying to enter my territory earlier. Thought about stomping it out, but it looks closer to whatever you are. Figured I would give you a chance to remind the higher life forms of Earthlings about staying away from my area.” She told him, arms folded and leaning against the door frame.

“Ugh, Onion…” Stephen groaned as he gently put him down. He focused back on Jasper, a light frown on his face. “Did you have to tie him up though?”

Jasper pushed herself off of the doorframe and shrugged. “The thing moved too much.”

Stephen sighed but realized that continuing this conversation wasn’t going to get him anywhere. “Well, thank you. I’ll talk to him about staying away.”

Jasper grunted, “Whatever. Next time I have no mercy. That’s as far as my respect goes.”

“Got it,” Stephen said, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. It was progress, right?

Jasper glanced behind Stephen at the others and let out a harsh chuckle before turning and walking away.

Ame wanted to run after her and give Jasper a piece of her mind, but Crimson put a hand on her shoulder. Ame looked up at her and she shook her head.

Stephen watched Jasper go and breathed out a sigh of relief. He undid the knots that kept Onion tied up. “Okay, now do you know why I had that long talk with you and your friends about not going there?” he asked Onion.

Onion nodded his head, looking up at him with wide eyes. He made some motions at him and Dewdrop before looking back up at Stephen.

Stephen groaned, running a hand through his hair, “Yeah, sure. Rainbow will pay you a visit soon. As long as you  **never** go there again, okay? Make sure to tell your friends too.”

Onion nodded his head again with a smile and ran off.

Stephen mumbled a few choice words under his breath and turned back to everyone. “Well, that went well?” he said, half saying and half asking.

“Who was that!?” Steven exclaimed as he ran past everyone to come up to Stephen.

Stephen heard Pearl shout in surprise and guessed that she had been holding Steven back. “Eh… that’s a long story.” Stephen said, glancing at Ame.

Ame nodded in agreement, looking annoyed. “Yeah, she’s a stubborn jerk.”

“Well, it makes sense that there would be some tension having all these different gems around,” Garnet added to the conversation.

The future gems and Stephen looked at each other. It was easy to forget that their past selves haven’t gone through any of this. They had no idea of the gems who would come later and disrupt their life. They didn’t even know about Lapis yet!

It was good that they didn’t know who Jasper was, even if Ame was a little disappointed. She had wanted to vent with Amethyst about how sucky Jasper was.

Dewdrop had something else she wanted to address after witnessing Stephen’s conversation with Jasper, “What is this I hear about a fight?” she asked Stephen.

Stephen blushed and looked embarrassed. “Ah… well, Ame tried to talk me out of trying to convince Jasper to join Little Homeschool but…. Eh…. I may have gone to talk to her anyway? And she wouldn’t listen to me and so, maybe I told her I’d fight her if that would make her listen?” he said unsure of how the gems would react. He glanced away from them and rubbed the back of his neck.

“Steven…” Dewdrop huffed, “I thought we all agreed to give up on her and leave her be in the woods?”

Ame was laughing at Steven’s response, “Good, I hope you kicked her butt! She deserves a smackdown.”

“Ame!” Dewdrop yelled. Although she didn’t know why she was shocked. No matter how mature Ame got she was still the same in some ways.

Ame shrugged her shoulders, unashamed. Stephen chuckled, glad the attention was off him, while Crimson just watched the whole conversation with a smile.

The past gems watched and listened. Pearl wasn’t too thrilled that apparently, Steven was fighting gems off on his own. What if he had gotten hurt? It all sounded way too dangerous. Amethyst, on the other hand, was enjoying it all immensely. She needed to get together with Ame and Stephen and see what other fun things they got up to.

“Okay, we are getting off-topic now,” Crimson said. No matter how much she enjoyed her family’s interactions, there was one major thing they needed to address.

At this point, everyone was standing in a group and she didn’t want to get sidetracked again by asking them to sit and get comfortable. So, she just continued.

“Now, that Garnet’s future vision is clearer, knowing the truth, we can work together to figure out what we need to know to send you all back to your time. Stephen broke the timepiece here and yours was broken to get here. That means we don’t have a working timepiece on Earth.” Crimson explained.

The past gems paled at the realization while the rest of the future gems and Stephen looked worried.

“Remember, I said on  _ Earth _ . That doesn’t mean there isn’t another one on a different planet.” She said with a smile, looking at Stephen now.

Stephen realized what she was getting at and he was not thrilled, “ **Ugh** . Really?” He whined.

Dewdrop and Ame caught on and they both laughed. They knew how Stephen felt about the diamonds. They had gotten used to Stephen coming back from Homeworld complaining about how suffocating and needy the diamonds were. Although, he hadn’t been back to see them since the diamonds came and took Spinel back with them. It was weird to realize that this was something they could laugh about now.

“Not funny guys!” Stephen groaned.

“Um, what are we missing?” Amethyst asked them.

Pearl and Steven also looked confused. Garnet was silent, but her fists clenched up. Obviously, she saw what they were talking about. She wasn’t thrilled about their relationship with the diamonds. It was too early to have any type of positive association with them.

The future gems looked at each other and then at Stephen.

Stephen noticed immediately and shook his head. “Oh, no. If I get to suffer through this then you can explain what I need to do.” Stephen told them, enjoying their winces.

“Um, well. Now that the cat’s outta the bag with knowing who Rose really was…” Ame started and trailed off, looking to Dewdrop.

Dewdrop looked panicked when Ame looked at her and she turned to look at Crimson. Unfortunately, Crimson was also looking at her. Dewdrop huffed, uncomfortable, but she continued, “Long story, short. The diamonds came to Earth to try and destroy it. At the time, they knew about Stephen but thought he was Rose and thought he was the one who shattered Pink. Stephen was able to convince them about who he was. He then went to Homeworld to convince White Diamond too. After a battle, he convinced her and now they… enjoy his presence?” She said, unsure at the end of the explanation. None of them wanted to go as far as to say the diamonds loved Stephen. Even if that was what the diamonds told him. It still made the future gems uncomfortable to think about it even if they saw how attached the diamonds were to Stephen.

Stephen’s cheeks glowed pink before dimming. He laughed, “Y-ep, that simple!” he said, his voice cracking a little at the beginning. The future gems all looked at him with concern but he waved it off.

“Honestly, it’s not a big deal to go and talk to them. They are just a little smothering. Hopefully, with Spinel there now they are better.” He said, trying to convince himself too. He had put off contacting them at all since the whole Spinel thing. He felt a little guilty for not checking in, but he had been busy with Little Homeschool too.

“Spinel?” Pearl squeaked out. “You know who she is? You found her?” she asked, concerned.

Stephen looked a little embarrassed that he let that slip out. So, much for controlling how much they told the past gems and Steven. “Yeah… more like she found us after my message to the universe.” He told Pearl.

The rest of the past gems and Steven looked confused. The past gems didn’t recognize the name at all and figured it must have been a gem from Homeworld that Pearl used to know.

“Who’s Spinel?” Steven asked them.

“She was a… friend of your moms,” Pearl told Steven. “I honestly didn’t know what happened to her after we left to come to the Earth. And, well… I may have forgotten about her over the years too.” she said blushing.

“Yeah,” Stephen said a little annoyed. “You may want to find her when you get back, but honestly I can’t see a way of doing so without it being a disaster. At least if you go to her you can stop her from getting anything that makes her more dangerous.” He told them.

“What? Dangerous?” Pearl asked, concerned. “But she would never…”

Garnet tried looking ahead, but it must be too far in the future because she couldn’t see any possibilities. She didn’t like the idea of a gem who could be dangerous to them.

“Well, being told by mom that she was playing a game and needed to stay in one spot and then left there for six thousand years must have changed her,” Stephen told her agitated, his cheeks glowing pink.

“Wha- but… Your mom… Rose wouldn’t do that!” Pearl cried out.

Garnet was frowning and Amethyst looked confused.

Steven fidgeted before using his right hand to hold his left arm. He really wasn’t liking all the things he kept hearing about his mom. That she hid who she was, even if it was to try and make things better. Now, she had abandoned someone for more years than he could even imagine. The more he heard, the more uncomfortable and upset he got.

Dewdrop frowned; she didn’t like how Stephen had told them the truth. She cut in before Stephen could continue, sending him a warning look.

He looked at her and huffed, turning away and taking calming breaths that made the pink fade.

“It’s true.” Dewdrop told Pearl and the rest of them calmly. “Rose did leave her alone, but I don’t think she meant to just leave her forever or at least I don’t think she thought that Spinel would continue the game for so long. It doesn’t make it right, but I don’t think she meant any harm.”

Stephen let out a harsh laugh turning to face Dewdrop again. “Why don’t you tell that to Spinel?” He told her.

Dewdrop frowned at Stephen. “Now, that’s not fair Stephen-“ she started but was cut off by him.

“No, what’s ‘not fair’ was running around trying to get your memories back with no powers while an injector was slowly killing the Earth!” He yelled at her, his whole body lighting up pink.

The past gems all tensed up, they had noticed the pink glow before at this point. However, they didn’t feel the need to address it since the future gems ignored it. This though, activating while angry or upset, didn’t seem like a good thing. Steven frowned and backed away, concerned for his future self and slightly afraid.

“Stephen! Calm down!” Dewdrop scolded him.

Ame stood back, concerned, but she didn’t know what to do. Why was this power activating now? Crimson stood by, trying to look at all the possible futures and what the next step should be.

Stephen tried to calm down, but Dewdrop’s scolding just made him angrier. Before he could retort or even move, Steven’s actions drew his attention and he frowned. Was he… scaring his younger self? The thought horrified him and the anger disappeared along with the pink glow. He frowned, frustrated tears clinging to his lashes “I’m… sorry.” He said, rubbing his face and eyes.

Dewdrop frowned, concerned. This is the second outburst that she has seen from Stephen concerning this pink power. Thankfully, nothing broke this time. However, she could see how upset Stephen was and she took a step towards him, laying a hand on his shoulder. “It’s alright. I think maybe we should move on and focus back on the task?” she told Stephen, but focused the question more at Crimson who nodded her head.

Stephen took a deep breath and nodded. He turned to the past gems who looked at him with concern. Pearl was slightly covering Steven. Stephen almost broke down at the sight, but he steeled himself, “Sorry guys… It’s a new power that I’m still learning to control. Of course, it’s connected to my emotions like the rest of my powers.” He told them with a strained laugh.

“I’ve never seen Rose have a power like that,” Pearl said suspiciously, although she did move away from partially shielding Steven.

Dewdrop cut in, “It’s a power that Rose had problems with before she met us.” She told Pearl and the rest of the past gems. “Unfortunately, as much as we would like to think that we knew everything about her, she didn’t tell us  _ everything _ .” She explained to Pearl.

Pearl wanted to argue but knew that her future self must be correct. She couldn’t see her future self lying to her.

“Trust me, I know how hard it is to learn about things Rose kept from us. I honestly just recently learned about this power myself when talking with Volley. She was Rose’s pearl before us.” Dewdrop told Pearl.

“Wait, you’ve met the previous pearl?” Pearl asked her. “What happened?” Pearl was curious after Dewdrop’s explanation earlier.

Dewdrop looked at Stephen, who looked uncomfortable. “I’ll tell you later.” She replied to Pearl.

Pearl had seen Dewdrop look to Stephen. She saw how uncomfortable he was and nodded, “Alright.”

“Okay, can we move on from all this serious crap?” Amethyst asked loudly. She was uncomfortable with all the news and happenings. So, she tried to lighten the situation and change the subject.

Ame saw what her past self was doing and smiled at her. “Yeah, how ‘bout we let Stephen call the diamonds and you all can see their reaction to him? It’s pretty hilarious.”

“Ame…” Stephen groaned out, but he did appreciate the change in the subject.

“Oh! Oh! I want to see the diamonds!” Steven said waving his hand in the air and jumping up and down.

Amethyst laughed at Steven’s excitement “Yeah, let’s meet the has-been dictators!” She shouted.

Pearl and Garnet looked uncomfortable. Garnet really had no urge to ever see the diamond's faces again, but she also didn’t want to miss anything important.

Dewdrop rolled her eyes at the antics of the two amethysts but smiled. “That actually sounds like a good idea, Ame.” She teased her. “What do you think, Crimson?”

“I see it going well as long as the past gems stay hidden until we have a chance to explain the situation,” Crimson replied.

“Alright, let’s go!” Ame cheered. “I’ll lead the way.” She started walking towards the stairs.

“Ugh, Ame wait up. I gotta fix some things first!” Stephen said, panicking slightly and ran to catch up.

“Like what? Your room is clean. Trust me, P-Dewdrop wouldn’t let it be any other way.” Ame said, walking up the stairs. “Unless you have something else out that itty bitty you shouldn’t see?” She said stopping and turning around to make a suggestive face at Stephen.

Stephen hadn’t expected Ame to stop and almost ran into her. His face turned a normal human red at Ame’s words. “Of course not!” he squeaked out. “Jeesh, Ame!” he yelled at her, embarrassed before squeezing passed her.

Ame burst out laughing and Amethyst joined her. Steven just looked confused while Pearl looked horrified at Ame’s words.

Dewdrop rolled her eyes, “Really Ame?”

“What! He is at that age now, ya know.” Ame replied with a smirk before continuing up the stairs with Amethyst following. Amethyst let out a snort at Ame’s reply.

Dewdrop let out a gasp. “Ame!” she said, following quickly after them to scold Ame.

Steven turned to Pearl, “What are they talking about?” he asked confused over the whole conversation.

“Nothing!” Pearl squeaked out before rushing to follow her future self, leaving Steven with the two garnets.

Steven turned to them.

Crimson and Garnet looked at each other before Crimson turned to Steven. “It’ll make sense when you are older. Let’s go.” She told Steven.

“Oh, okay…” Steven replied, before turning to follow everyone else up the stairs. He still wanted to know what was so funny, but he wanted to meet the diamonds even more.

Crimson and Garnet followed behind Steven, glad they didn’t have to try and explain.

By the time Steven got up the stairs, the others were already making their way to up to the thing that looked like a greenhouse. Crimson and Garnet came up behind him.

He stopped to take a look around, excited to see his future self’s room. He did like how much space there was and he took a look at the pictures. He was glad the one with him and Garnet was still up. He also enjoyed the picture of all the gems and Stephen together and smiling. He would’ve continued to look around, but he was stopped by Garnet.

“You’ll have time to continue looking later.” She said, smiling at him. “Let’s catch up with the others.”

Steven gasped as he remembered where they were going. He didn’t want to miss out on meeting the diamonds! He ran out onto the next set of stairs.

Crimson and Garnet smiled at each other before following.

Finally, they caught up to the others who were waiting for them.

Stephen smiled at them as Garnet closed the door behind them.

“Okay, if Garnet, Pearl, Amethyst, and Steven stand right here,” he started, pointing to a spot that was by the control panel but out of view of the screen that Stephen had opened up, “then the diamonds shouldn’t be able to see you until we want them to. Right Crimson?” he asked her.

Crimson nodded, “Yep.” She replied.

The past gems and Steven walked over to the spot. Steven sat down against the wall, a little tired out from everything that has happened. He could at least still kind of see what was on the screen from here which made him happy. Amethyst joined him on the floor, sitting next to him while the other two gems stood on either side of Steven and Amethyst.

“Remember, stay out of sight until I call you over, okay?” Stephen told the past gems and Steven, more so saying it for Steven and Amethyst.

Garnet and Pearl nodded while Amethyst rolled her eyes. “Aye, aye captain!” She said.

Steven smiled at Stephen and nodded. He was still very excited to see what the diamonds looked like.

Stephen, satisfied with their responses, turned to the future gems. “You ready?”

They all nodded and stood behind Stephen. “Okay,” he started, taking a deep breath, “here we go.”

With that, he typed in a few things and hit a button. A second later, a familiar but unexpected face appeared.

“Hullo! You’ve reached the diamond line, whatcha need!” the pink gem asked before she actually looked at who called.

“Steven! Ya called!” she said excitedly.

“Heh, Spinel! You’re in charge of the diamond line right now?” Steven asked, confused.

“Yeah, they’re havin’ a little meeting right now. So, they asked if I would watch the diamond line for ‘em! Of course, I said yes!” she replied, smiling.

“That’s… great.” Stephen said, giving her a strained smile back. He hadn’t been expecting to talk to her right away.

“Aw, I see the whole gang’s there!” she said with a smaller smile. “Eh, no hard feelings?” she asked, nervously.

The past gems and Steven watched the exchange with curiosity. Pearl was surprised at the changes to Spinel’s look, but it made sense after what Dewdrop and Steven said earlier.

“It’s all good,” Ame said with a shrug. The other two gems nodded in agreement.

“Aw, good.” Spinel said with a breath of relief and swiped the back of her hand over her forehead.

“The diamonds will be so excited to see ya, Steven! They were just complaining the other day that you haven’t contacted them in forever!” Spinel said with a giggle.

“Oh, sorry Spinel…” Steven said, feeling guilty. He really hoped the diamonds weren’t ignoring her or spending all their time with Spinel complaining about not seeing or hearing from him. 

“Nah. It’s no biggie! We’ve been havin’ lots a fun. They’ve been figurin’ out how to use their powers for good and I’ve been helping them! That’s actually what their meeting’s about.” She told him.

“Oh!” Stephen said in surprise. “That’s… that’s good.”

“There’s been lots of changes happenin’ since I’ve joined them. It’s really a sight ta see! You all should come and see it for yourselves.” She told them.

“Ah, we will.” Stephen said, “Um, should I call back after their meeting?” he asked her.

“Oh, no!” Spinel said, “I’ll go get ‘em now! They would be really sad if they found out they missed your call. I know they’d rather put the meetin’ on hold!” she said before running off and away from the screen.

“Okay, then,” Steven said, even though Spinel was already gone.

Barely a minute had gone by before they heard stomping heading towards the screen.

Spinel showed back up first, “Here they come!” she shouted before the screen abruptly changed to show the three diamond’s faces close together.

“Steven!” all three shouted at once.

“Heh, hey…” Stephen said weakly with a wave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yep, you can blame the angst on the lastest episode XD.  
> I swear I do have some angst planned but this was not planned lol  
> It just happened, I swear! 
> 
> Also, I stopped here because after this point there are possible spoilers. I plan on using some of what we learned in the Homeworld Bound, so I don't want to give anything away for those who are waiting until Friday.


	6. Diamonds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I went back and re-watched the Steven and the Stevens episode. It actually looks like Steven was able to not only travel back a couple days but he also went forward in time… Yikes… So, that comes back up in this story and I fixed it so it matches up better with canon. 
> 
> Also, we are going to pretend that Stephen has some left-over and mixed up memories of his time travel experience. Even though, technically, the other Steven stopped him from ever experiencing any of the time-traveling that happened originally. I’m just going to pretend that the time travel left a vague imprint on his mind. 
> 
> Again, thank you to my beta DekuEAM. I really don't know what I would do without her :)

“Oh, Steven… It’s really you!” Blue Diamond said excitedly as she smiled at the screen.

White Diamond shoved the other two so she took up most of the screen, making them both look at her in slight annoyance. “Steven! I thought you’d forgotten us.” She pouted dramatically.

“Ugh, White. Move over. You can’t always hog the screen!” Yellow Diamond said, glaring at White. Then she looked over at Stephen, “Did I use that word correctly? I’ve been looking into Earth’s many languages. Obviously focusing on English, since that is the one you use and I found out that your language changes often throughout the years. Why it would do that, I don’t know.”

Stephen chuckled awkwardly as the Diamonds continued to throw questions at him without pause. The future gems stood behind him trying not to laugh, even Crimson cracked a small smile. There was something satisfying about seeing the Diamonds fawning over Stephen and losing the cool composure they once had. To think that dictators could be turned into smothering aunts.

“Okay, okay. Guys, I literally can’t answer you all at the same time.” Stephen told them, waving his arms around to get their attention. Once they quieted down, he continued, “Yes, Yellow you used that word correctly. And yes, Blue I am eating enough of my ‘human supplements’. Of course, I’m not ignoring you on purpose White. I’ve just been busy.” Stephen finished, rolling his eyes at the last one. The silence was nice though.

“You’re always too busy now, Starlight,” White complained. “You used to visit us all the time; helping us fix our colonies and end the fighting.”

“Yes, well that was finished a while ago and that was before Little Homeworld was done. The next step was to build a place that gems could go to and learn about how to make their own decisions. We did that, and I’ve been helping run the place.” He told her, his voice steady. He really disliked that nickname, but White couldn’t seem to stop using it no matter how much he asked.

“That could easily be handled by someone else! I don’t understand how running something as small as that could use up all your time.” White argued, still pouting. “It took you almost a year to contact us again! I looked up how your Earth time works. That’s a long time for you humans. It’s like you don’t even care about us.” She continued with an exaggerated sad look.

“ _ Oh boy, here we go.”  _ Stephen muttered under his breath. “Come on White. That’s like nothing at all to you guys. I figured you would be fine waiting a little longer while I handled Little Homeworld.”

At this point the future gems, Blue and Yellow just watched the argument as it went back and forth between the two of them. This wasn’t unusual. Even when Steven visited more often and stayed the night, White always threw a fit when he had to leave for Earth again. Spinel, who was sitting on Blue’s shoulder, did look concerned at the argument. She decided to keep quiet for the moment and let it continue since no one else was getting worried over it, but she wished to intervene.

The past gems, however, looked on in amazement. Pearl was shocked at how casual the diamonds were and just how out of character White Diamond was acting. She remembered White Diamond much differently from this new version of her. Although, she still knew how to lay on the guilt trip. She thought back to how White would make Pink feel guilty for breaking rules or etiquette any time the smaller diamond had done something wrong.

Even Garnet was shocked at the difference. The look in Blue’s eyes was… much softer than before. They weren’t the hardened eyes of a diamond who would shatter someone for a single mistake. Amethyst just thought it was cool how much power Steven had in the future. She remembered the stories told to her when she was younger and Stephen had these guys wrapped around his finger! The fact that he could stand there and argue any of them was crazy.

The argument continued a little longer before Stephen got fed up. “Okay! Just stop White. Actually, what I want to talk to you about might end up with me visiting you guys for a few days anyway. However, if you want to continue arguing then I can hang up and wait another year to contact you.” Stephen told her.

The other two diamonds eyes widened in shock and then they both glared at White, daring her to continue the argument.

White saw their looks and rolled her eyes. It wasn’t like she couldn’t just surprise him again by coming to Earth. However, she wouldn’t pass up the chance to have him come visit for a day or two. “Alright. I concede, Starlight.”

Stephen sighed in relief. He was glad that worked. He would say that he felt guilty for treating them that way, but he kind of needed to with how pushy they were towards him.

“Okay, so…” Stephen started, trying to figure out how to explain. “Did you know about the timepieces that were hidden in a gem building here on Earth?” he asked them. He couldn’t remember the name of the gem structure now, but he hoped this was enough information for the diamonds to go off of.

“Oh, yes. I do remember giving Pink permission to copy the plans on how to make timepieces so she could continue the experiments on her first colony.” White said thoughtfully. “I think her Peridot’s only finished the one before the rebellion started and the project was put on hold. I remember they gave the finished timepiece a ridiculous name.”

Both Dewdrop and Pearl huffed at that last sentence. They didn’t think the name was ridiculous. It was quite fitting really.

“Wait, so does that mean that more could be made?” Stephen asked. He didn’t remember as many details anymore, although thinking about it earlier was helping to jog his memory a little bit, but Pearl had made it seem like the timepiece was a one of a kind thing.

“Why, of course. The plans were archived because the research to extend the timeframe failed to turn up results. It was somewhat useless to only be able to go back as far as one of your Earth days. Most of our timepieces ended up as little toys for some of the elite; with strict rules on how to use them of course. However, all the ones that were made are long gone now. They break down after a few decades of use and lose power.” White explained. “Why the sudden interest in timepieces? Did you find the one on Earth?” she asked him.

“Oh, no. We found it a long time ago and I broke it after an… eventful day.” Stephen said, shuddering. “Actually, we had something else really strange happen.” He continued.

This got the diamonds’ attention.

“Well, we have some visitors right now. The best way I can describe it is another set of me and the gems traveled to the future using the same timepiece I destroyed. Our timelines match up until that mission. In our timeline, Amethyst grabbed the wrong timepiece, but I grabbed the right one before the security measures kicked in and we went back home. Then, I had an adventure with the timepiece before destroying it to get rid of… well to put things back to normal. In their timeline, Amethyst crashed into the other me and broke the timepiece along with the other non-working timepieces. It created a huge backlash that sucked them up and dropped them off here in the future. So, it definitely exceeded a day.” Steven told the diamonds, hoping his explanation made sense. He looked back at the future gems and they all gave him a thumbs up.

“Fascinating! Where are your past selves now? Oh, this would be back when you were a few years younger, right?” White said, excited to meet a younger Steven. Well, she was also excited to see the impossible too. They were never able to figure out how to accomplish this and yet a single accident made it possible. Blue also looked excited at the prospect of having a second Steven around.

Stephen shook his head. Leave it to White to focus on the fact that there would be another younger him around.

Yellow must have been on the same wavelength as Stephen because she spoke up, “Now, wait White. While I’m excited to see this too and I can see why Steven called us. He must be trying to help them find a way back to their time.” Yellow explained, rolling her eyes. Nowadays it felt like sometimes she was the  _ only _ serious diamond around anymore.

Steven nodded gratefully at her. “Yeah, we can’t try to recreate what happened to them because our timepiece is gone. Also, I’m not sure that just recreating what happened would send them back to their time. For all we know, it could send them forward even farther or it could send them to a random time backward too. I was hoping you might have some more information that we can use to help them out.” Steven explained.

Yellow nodded in understanding. “Well, like White said, we were never able to develop a way to increase the length of time or get it to go forwards in time. Maybe Pink’s peridots figured out a way? Was your working timepiece able to send you back farther than a day?” she asked Stephen.

“Eh, maybe? I can’t really remember, but since I’ve been thinking about it… I think I  _ was  _ able to go forward and backward in time by a few days.” He said, blushing. It wasn’t like he ever thought he would need to know how it worked in the future. Plus, the memories were all jumbled up and foggy; like he had watched a TV show out of order. He did remember wanting to get right of the other Stevens so he could forget about the whole experience. A shiver raced down his spine as he remembered the chaos; it had not been a fun time watching himself die about a thousand times over.

“Wait, didn’t you tell us you only went back in time by a few hours?” Ame asked Stephen.

“Heh, yeah… Honestly, it’s all a jumbled mess in my head. Even back then it almost hurt to think about what happened.” Stephen told them, shrugging.

Yellow sighed and pinched her nose. “Well, no use getting frustrated over something you can’t change. It does sound like Pink’s gems succeeded in improving the design though, which makes their silly name for the device more understandable. That means it is at least possible to not only increase the length of time but also change the direction of which way you are going through time. However, the fact that it carried not one, but many gems into the future is baffling. Usually, it can only transport one user who is thinking of the exact time and place they want to go.” Yellow told them, turning to Blue and White. “What do you two think?” she asked them

“Your explanation and reasoning are sound. While we can’t yet explain why so many were able to be transported at once, we can assume that we can improve upon the length and direction. Maybe, the fact that the timepiece broke and mixed with the inactive sand of other timepieces gave it the power it needed to transport multiple gems.” White added to Yellow's theory.

“I agree,” Blue added, holding out her hand for Spinel to swing on. She had never much cared for the project when she could trust her sapphires to see the future. What use was the past?

Spinel had stayed mostly quiet, realizing that they all needed to think about the situation. So, she occupied herself with entertaining Blue for the moment. However, she was kind of excited to see this past Steven. Maybe it was far enough back to be the one that Steven had mentioned back when she held him over the injector. The version of himself that was still pretty powerless. She did still feel terrible about the whole ordeal, but she was curious to see what he looked like at that point in his life.

White and Yellow smirked at each other over Blue’s rather passive agreement. She had never really cared much about the timepieces that they had worked hard on to perfect.

White turned to look at Stephen, “You wouldn’t happen to have access to the blueprints, would you?”

Stephen glanced at the future gems, who shook their heads and looked back at the diamonds, “Uh, no. Unfortunately, we won’t have access again for another 90 years or more.” He told them. He couldn’t remember how long the wait was but he knew it was about 100 or more back when they went to get the timepiece and it had only been a few years.

“Hmm, well that is unfortunate. We will ask for volunteers to work on the timepiece project again. See if we can’t find some of the original workers. If we tell them it’s to help you, I’m sure we will have many volunteers.” White told him with a smile.

Stephen blushed again and looked away, a little uncomfortable. Gems these days either loved him for freeing them, were indifferent, or hated him for ruining their way of life.

White continued, “While we have gems working on that, we will also have some working on a way to retrieve the blueprints. It shouldn’t be too hard to retrieve it with the resources we have now. It would greatly speed up the research which, in turn, would get the others back to their time faster.”

“That sounds great! Thank you, White!” Stephen told her, actually giving her a real smile. “Just remember that however they retrieve the information, they can’t harm the Earth or it’s creatures.” He reminded her. It really  _ was _ a relief to have so much help on this though. He didn’t even want to imagine how hard this would be without Homeworld’s resources.

“Yes, yes of course. Earth will not be harmed.” White said with the wave of her hand. Then, White smiled back at Steven before it turned into more of a smirk. “Now, for your end of the bargain. I believe you said you would pay us a visit? I think it would be best for you to explain why we are continuing the research again. Maybe even have the younger you join as well? That would convince the gems and make them realize how serious the problem is.” White told Stephen, beaming at him at the end. She was proud of how great her argument was.

Stephen sighed, his shoulders slumping. He should have known better. “Yeah, I think we could make that happen… maybe… I guess I should probably introduce you to them?” he said, although he finished his sentence as more of a question.

“Oh, yes!” Blue exclaimed, finally perking up from the uninteresting part of the conversation. This was the moment she had been waiting for. Spinel stopped swinging and twirling herself around on Blue’s hand. She too, looked at the screen curiously, waiting for the past gems and Steven to show up.

The other two diamonds nodded, both clearly excited.

“Okay,” Stephen started before glancing at Crimson. Crimson nodded her head, giving him the all-clear to go ahead and introduce them. “Come on out guys,” Stephen said to the past gems and Steven, who was surprisingly able to sit quietly the whole time.

Steven jumped up, practically bubbling over with energy and excitement. Stars were in his eyes as he ran up to the screen and stared at the diamonds and Spinel. “Oh my gosh! Finally! It was so hard to sit there for so long and not say anything! But I promised Stephen I would wait because he said if I could wait, I would get to meet you guys and see what you looked like! You guys look humongous!” Steven exclaimed, rushing through his sentences in excitement before throwing up his hands at the last sentence.

“Ah, Steven!” Pearl yelled, panicking. She was the first to follow after the excited boy. Garnet lagged behind Amethyst who came over after Steven and Pearl. Garnet made sure to stay at the very edge of the screen behind the others. She really didn’t want to have anything to do with them; even if they had changed.

The diamonds almost immediately started cooing at the younger Steven after his excited speech.

“Oh, look! That’s what Steven used to look like when he first started visiting us!” Blue said. “I forgot how adorable he looked.” She finished, looking fondly at the young Steven.

White had smiled sweetly at the boy’s appearance, “A mini Starlight. I bet he would be more willing to visit us.”

“I can’t believe he used to be so small!” Yellow started, before turning to Stephen, “How young is he? I’m assuming younger than when we first met?” She asked him. After all, this Steven didn’t fear them at all, which meant that he probably hadn’t been through the trial they had put him through when they thought he was Rose Quartz.

Stephen had watched the whole exchange uncomfortably. He always seemed to forget how excitable he used to be until he watched Steven get excited about something. And the diamonds reactions! Oh, boy. Was that how the others saw his interactions with the diamonds. They really did fawn over him.

It took a moment to realize that Yellow had asked him a question. He was getting used to the name Stephen. “Oh, yeah. Um, he’s thirteen. He just started going on missions and stuff. He only has some control over a couple of his powers, I think.” He explained to Yellow. “Also, me and the older gems are going by nicknames for now. It’s kind of confusing to have a set of two people with the same name. So, I’m going by Stephen while he keeps the name Steven.” He told the diamonds and Spinel as a whole.

“Ohhh, so that’s why he referred to you as Stephen earlier!” Spinel exclaimed as she examined this younger Steven. After taking in his words, she realized she was right when she assumed this Steven might be the one he was talking about during their fight. “What are the others called,” she asked.

“Oh! Oh! Can I answer?” Steven asked turning to Stephen to give him puppy eyes.

Stephen smiled and nodded, “Sure, buddy.”

“Yay! I got to give all the future gems nicknames.” He told the diamonds, smiling at them proudly. “So, future Garnet is Crimson, Amethyst is Ame, and Pearl is Dewdrop!” he said.

The diamonds made sure they were all paying attention to Steven’s explanation. He was so cute and happy. They were more than glad to indulge this Steven who looked so excited to see them.

“That’s great Steven! Very creative.” Blue said, nodding her head in approval.

Yellow and White nodded in agreement. “Very creative indeed, Starlight,” White told him.

“Is that the nickname you gave future me?” Steven asked her.

“In a way, yes,” White said, smiling down at him from the screen. “It was your mother’s nickname. I just felt like it still fit you and your future self. You both shine like stars and you definitely have the energy of a star!” White told Steven, giving a small laugh and glanced at Stephen giving him a shy smile.

Stephen noticed White’s attention and gave a half-smile, half-grimace. He didn’t much care for the comparison between him and his mom again. It seemed he couldn’t escape it anywhere. Someone always had to bring up his similarities to her: White, Pink Pearl, Pearl, and even a couple of other Homeworld gems!

White noticed his discomfort and her smile turned to a small confused frown before she refocused on Steven with a smile. Steven had been grinning madly about the new information about his mom and having his own nickname.

The other two diamonds and Spinel noticed Stephen’s reaction as well, but it wasn’t the first time. Sometimes, it seemed like they were the only ones who noticed Stephen’s discomfort with the nickname. Yellow had tried talking to White about it, but White was convinced they were overreacting.

“Well, anyway” White continued. “How about you help Ste-Stephen get ready to visit. We have so much we can show you on Homeworld!” she said excitedly.

“Oh, yes! Let’s get ready right now! Come on Stephen!” Steven said and tried to pull him back towards his room.

“Whoa, wait a sec buddy,” Stephen said, laughing. He turned to the diamonds, “Okay, we’ll see you soon then.”

The diamonds got in a quick goodbye before he turned off the screen. Once the screen was blank, he took a deep breath in and out to help center himself. He wasn’t really looking forward to this, but he would try to focus on Steven’s excitement and make this a good experience for him.

Stephen turned to the gems, “So, should I get Steven and I ready to go? I’m sure I still have some old clothes that should fit Steven.” He told the gems.

“Yes, in that one drawer in your bedroom. I kept all the shirts from before that were still in good condition along with a couple of pants.” Dewdrop told him.

“Are those the ones that you wash every month to keep them smelling fresh?” Ame teased her, laughing.

Dewdrop huffed in embarrassment. “Yes! Memories are important to humans. He should have mementos to hold onto and pass down to his children one day.” She defended herself, blushing. “Clothes just don’t smell right after sitting around for a few weeks.”

“Well, I think that is a splendid idea Dewdrop,” Pearl told her, trying to comfort her.

This just set off both Amethyst and Ame who fell to the floor, laughing.

While an argument broke out between the two Pearls and Amethysts, Crimson came over to Stephen and Steven.

“Go ahead and get ready. Garnet and I will handle those four.” She told them with a smile.

Stephen shook his head fondly at the four who were bickering and nodded his head at Crimson. This time he had to lead Steven away as he kept glancing back at the gems.

Steven looked back at the four and then looked at Stephen, concerned. “Are you sure… they will be okay?” He asked uncertainly. He was used to his Pearl and Amethyst getting into fights and he still didn’t like it when it happened. Usually, he was the one to help break it up; sometimes Garnet stepped in if it got really bad.

“Huh? Oh yeah. They’ll be fine. Dewdrop and Ame don’t really get into serious fights anymore; just harmless bickering. They’ll keep it from going too far with Amethyst and Pearl. Plus, even if something does happen, Crimson and Garnet will break it up before it gets serious.” Stephen told Steven to reassure him.

“Whew, okay…” Steven said, relieved. He followed Stephen back up to his room where he helped Stephen pack for the short trip.

Once they were done, the two of them headed back. Stephen was carrying his very adult looking satchel that Steven kept staring at with admiration while Steven had Stephen’s old hamburger backpack. Steven had gotten excited to learn that Stephen was adult enough to have a super cool adult bag, but it meant that his old hamburger backpack sat in a corner or the closet now which made him kinda sad.

When they got back, it was just like Stephen had said, the bickering between the four was done with and they were all laughing about something.

Steven ran up to them, “We’re ready!” he yelled.

“Okay, here’s the plan.” Crimson started and everyone looked at her. “Garnet and I are going to stay behind because honestly I still don’t like the diamonds and Garnet really wants nothing to do with them right now.” She told the group honestly, folding her arms. “Plus, someone should stay behind in case gems or humans come looking for any of us. The rest of you will head to Homeworld and do what you need to do. Maybe use this time to show Amethyst and Pearl around Homeworld.” She finished, giving Dewdrop and Ame a look.

Ame and Dewdrop received her message and nodded. They wanted to give their past selves any advantage possible for what awaits them when they go back home.

“Okay, we’ll see you all tomorrow,” Crimson said with a smile. “Good luck.”

The four gems, Stephen, and Steven went to the warp pad. Steven waving crazily at Crimson and Garnet. “Bye guys! Love you!” he said, smiling.

Garnet smiled and made a heart with her hands, “Love you Steven, and you too Stephen.” She told them.

The inclusion made Stephen blush, but he smiled back at Garnet and waved at them both.

Crimson smiled sadly at the two and waved back. She had almost forgotten she used to do that. When had she stopped? She knew nowadays that Stephen didn’t do a lot of physical affection anymore; he made that clear on that snow day they had. He didn’t want to be treated like a kid and he took a lot of their affection as them treating him like a kid and not taking him seriously. He was better at spending time with them after that though and they learned to respect his boundaries. He still accepted affection from them, but only in small quantities.

When Crimson brought it up to Greg, he said Stephen’s actions were probably caused by the hormones that were preparing him for adulthood. Although, how that was working out with him being half gem was a mystery to the gems and Greg. One thing that was holding true to the information given in parenting books was Steven’s personality, likes, and dislikes changing often now that he was in his late teens. Although those things usually happened around 12-14 years old, they guessed that his gem half delayed it due to how his body aged with his mindset. However, if Crimson was really being honest, she still had no clue what she was doing when it came to raising Stephen.

When Crimson refocused, she realized the group had long since warped away and Garnet was staring at her bemused. Crimson gave her a small smile, slightly embarrassed. It had been a while since she lost focus like that.

“I didn’t want to interrupt your thinking,” Garnet said, explaining why she had just stood there staring at Crimson.

“Thank you. Now, I believe I promised to explain what happened to the corrupted gems and how most of the bubbles are gone now.” Crimson told her.

Garnet nodded and they both headed back into their room.

\----

As the group soared through the warp space towards Homeworld, Steven was worried. Why did things seem so awkward between Stephen and Crimson? Were Garnet and Crimson lying when they said they didn’t blame Stephen and Steven for what their mom did? Was Garnet gonna stop saying she loved him? Was it because she blamed him or maybe she just didn’t like him anymore?

Stephen looked over and saw the worried face Steven was making, “Hey, are you alright?” Stephen asked.

Steven looked up, startled. “Yeah, I’m fine…” he said, trying to smile.

Stephen frowned, seeing too many similarities between the two of them already. Had he really started to lie about his feelings and insecurities when he was this young? He went to confront Steven about lying, but at that moment they landed on the warp pad in Homeworld.

All four gems, Stephen and Steven looked around in shock. Stephen knew the diamonds had talked about bringing in organic flora, but wow. It didn’t take them long to redecorate the planet.

Dewdrop looked around in disbelief before turning to Stephen, “Stephen! Why didn’t you tell us about this? This is amazing! White diamond agreed to all of this?” she asked, shocked.

“Hey, don’t yell at me. This was one of the last things we talked about them doing on Homeworld. They hadn’t started it when I left last time.” He told her, shrugging.

Pearl looked around, tears in her eyes. She had missed parts of Homeworld like the view and now it was even better. To think that Rose’s son could bring about such tremendous change.

“Whoa, this is all fancy!” Amethyst said as she jumped off the warp pad. The warp pad was now outside and in front of them was the path leading to where the diamonds were now all staying together.

“Oh, yeah! I gotta introduce you to the Famethyst! Last time I talked to them they said they were going to make a stop on Homeworld. I think I even see the ship from here!” Ame said tugging Amethyst along.

“Uh, okay?” Amethyst replied, confused as to who the Famethyst were, but she was willing to check it out. If it got her future self this excited then it must be something fun.

“Ame!” Stephen yelled after her before she got too far away. Ame turned around, “Be careful.” He told her, giving her a look.

Ame’s eyes widened and she nodded her head. “Yeah, don’t worry about it.” She told him before continuing to drag Amethyst away.

Dewdrop sighed as they took off while Pearl looked stressed out. 

“The nerve! Amethyst never really grew up, did she?” Pearl asked her future self. 

“Oh no, she has grown up a lot. Some things will never change though.” Dewdrop told her with a smile, shaking her head. “That’s alright, part of the plan was to show you two around and they can catch up to us later.” Dewdrop started walking, leading them toward the entrance.

As they walked, they came across other gems walking by or standing around. Stephen could hear them whispering in confusion or shock at the sight of him and his younger self. He could hear some of them whispering about how he managed to make another one of himself and he almost laughed out loud. After all, most gems still didn’t understand how humans worked; how humans are born and are unique from one another.

Steven was trying to contain himself by not running off or running around the gems and Stephen, but his head was turning every which way to take in the sights. He waved at any gems who looked over and some smiled and waved back, even if they looked confused. A few gems seemed to give him and Stephen a weird salute, but he just waved and continued to look around.

Soon, they made it to the entrance and walked into the Throne Room. Stephen was amazed at how at ease the Homeworld gems were acting around the three diamonds standing there, towering over them. Most gems stopped to give a short salute or greet the diamonds before moving on with their business. When he had left, most gems had started to act that way, but there were still many who hadn’t gotten used to the informal way of greeting their diamonds. Many had still felt like they would get in trouble.

As soon as Stephen walked in though, most gems noticed and quickly walked out of the path between Stephen and the diamonds. They were used to their diamonds’ behavior around the new pink diamond and didn’t feel like almost getting trampled on because they were in the diamond’s way.

Blue was the first to spot them, “Stev-Stephen!” she shouted towards them, trying to get used to the new nickname for the older Steven.

Her shout perked up Yellow and White who looked at the entrance. They all walked as fast as they could over to the group without looking undignified. One gem, who hadn’t been fast enough to get out of their path, had to jump out of the way of the diamonds.

“What took you so long?” White asked them when they got up to the gems and the two Stevens. They all crouched down so they were at least somewhat closer to the group.

Stephen rolled his eyes, “It took us less than an hour.” He told her, “And be careful guys! You almost crushed a gem again.” He said, looking annoyed. The diamonds still weren’t used to having any gems underfoot. Usually, gems were in formation and out of the way; the only gem that was ever close enough to be underfoot were their pearls who knew better and knew where to stand.

“We had to pack for the trip!” Steven replied right after, holding up the bag.

The diamonds just nodded at Stephen’s warning before focusing their attention on Steven. Stephen sighed, but let it go for now.

“Oh, look at him White!” Blue exclaimed, going to pick Steven up, but Pearl was quicker and moved in front of him.

Blue stopped, “Oh… Did I do something wrong?” she asked, looking hurt.

Both White and Yellow also paused and looked at Pearl. White looked like she wanted to say something condescending before she fixed her expression.

Dewdrop smiled nervously, still uncomfortable talking to the diamonds. “Well, most humans don’t really like being picked up with no warning. However, my past self is coming from a time where you all are still enemies trying to kill them.” She reminded the diamonds.

“Well, that’s silly! All of you already know that’s no longer true in this time. She has nothing to fear!” White said, waving a hand as if to shoo away such thoughts.

Pearl gritted her teeth and stayed put. She logically knew these diamonds wouldn’t purposely harm either Steven, but she had spent so long trying to protect Steven from them. It was hard to let go.

Dewdrop saw Pearl’s struggle and walked up to her. “Why don’t I show you around? I have someone I’d like you to meet.” Dewdrop said, laying a hand on her shoulder.

“But-” Pearl started, looking frantically between her and Steven.

“Trust me. Stephen can handle them better than anyone else. Steven will be safe.” Dewdrop reassured her.

Pearl looked at her and then glanced at Stephen, unsure. She anxiously grabbed at the ribbon around her waist.

Stephen nodded at her, “Trust me and your future self, Pearl. It’ll be okay.”

Pearl still looked unsure but she glanced at the diamonds’ annoyed faces and back at Dewdrop who was now trying to gently tug her away.

“They can call us if they need us. I always carry a communicator so Stephen can reach me.” She told Pearl. 

“Alright, fine!” Pearl said, giving in. Although she was still anxious leaving either Steven with the diamonds.

“Steven!” Pearl said, turning to look at him as she dropped down to his level. “Let Stephen know if you need me okay?” she asked him, putting her hands on his shoulders.

“Of course, Pearl!” Steven said happily. He understood that the diamonds were not good gems where they came from, but they looked so friendly and happy right now. They had to be better during this time, right? Stephen wouldn’t have let him come otherwise. He didn’t want Pearl to worry. “Go have fun.” He said lightly pushing her towards Dewdrop.

Dewdrop smiled at him and grabbed Pearl’s hand. “Let’s go.” She said.

“Okay,” Pearl said nervously. She stood up and started to walk away. She glanced back at Steven and waved.

Steven waved back with a smile.

“Wowie! Now, that’s the Pearl I remember; overbearing and anxious.” Spinel said, leaning against Stephen with her arm around his shoulder.

Stephen jumped and looked at her in surprise. He forgot how quick she was. “Where were you?” he asked.

“Oh, hanging out on Blue.” She said, waving her arm towards the diamonds.

The diamonds had waited impatiently for the Pearls to get far enough away before they turned their attention back on the two Stevens.

“Finally!” White interrupted and she crouched down and held a hand out to Steven. “Would you mind climbing on so we can talk properly to you?” she asked him. The diamonds were not used to not getting their way right away. They were learning how to wait from Stephen, but it was slow progress. Stephen did notice they were getting better at it every time he saw them.

“Oh, yes!” Steven said with stars in his eyes. He jumped on White’s hand and held onto a finger as he was brought closer to them.

Stephen’s heart leaped into his throat at the action. He caught himself wanting to call out to Steven or tell White to stop; an image of White pulling out his diamond with her fingernails flashing through his mind. His face flushed pink before he remembered that White wasn’t like that anymore. ‘ _ Why am I still afraid of her?’  _ he thought, frustrated at himself. It wasn’t all the time, but it came in waves sometimes. Just movements from her or being too close to her brought up memories he’d rather forget. Then he would be fine for a few weeks or so before it would happen again. It was another reason he had been excited to get away the day he made that broadcast before Spinel attacked.

The pink in his face faded away but he caught Spinel staring curiously at him. She was still hanging off of him. “Uh, do you mind?” he asked her, slightly uncomfortable.

“Oh, heh. Yeah, sorry ‘bout that.” She said as she removed herself, her hand rubbing the back of her neck. “Are you… okay? You looked a little pink there for a sec.” she asked him, looking at him again with curiosity in her eyes. “I’ve never seen that before.” She told him.

Stephen looked at her for a moment before he averted his eyes. “Uh, it’s new… Nothing to worry about. Just gotta figure out how it works.” He told her. He didn’t like having another person so aware of this new power of his. He didn’t like the new power at all honestly. All his powers before this were used to protect and heal, but this power… this power just seemed to hurt others more than it helped.

“Oookay! Whatever ya say, boss!” Spinel said and then dramatically gave him a diamond salute, obviously teasing him.

Stephen tensed up at the salute, “I know you’re joking around, but please don’t do that.” He asked her. This whole confrontation was ending up more uncomfortable by the minute. He was trying to act calm but between the diamonds and Spinel… it was hard. Not that he had anything against Spinel! It was just hard to know how to act around her. The last time they saw each other she had just got done trying to kill him and he had pushed her towards staying with the diamonds.

Spinel’s face dropped, not getting the reaction she was going for. She frowned, “Sorry, can’t seem to do anything right for you. Huh?” she said, her laughter forced this time.

Steven, feeling guilty, went to apologize but was interrupted by Blue. “Oh, Stev-Stephen and Spinel. Please come join us.” Blue asked them.

Stephen startled; he had almost forgotten where he was in his talk with Spinel. He glanced up and saw all the diamonds smiling down at him and Spinel. Steven was waving at Stephen from White’s hand, stars still sparkling in his eyes.

“Uh, yeah, okay!” Stephen said. Before any of the diamonds could bring a hand down for him, he used his floating powers to launch himself up into the air. Blue held her hand out so he landed perfectly in her palm. Spinel, seeing what he did, turned her legs into springs so she could do the same.

Blue let out a laugh as Spinel landed on her hand too. “So creative!”

Steven was starstruck staring at his future self. “That was awesome!” he yelled over to Stephen. “What power is that? Oh, could you teach me?” he continued, giddy at the thought of being able to fly through the air.

Stephen smiled at his younger self. “I dunno how well I can teach you, but I can try.” He said, uncertain. He wasn’t sure if his powers could be taught. They kinda just activated when needed at the beginning and then he was able to learn how to bring them up at will.

“Yes!” Steven said, jumping up and down on White’s hand.

The diamonds watched the interaction between the two with smiles on their faces while Spinel let out a giggle at how giddy Steven was.

“Aw, little Steven is so cute!” Spinel told Stephen. “Maybe… could-” she started but seemed to have issues finishing the question so she started over, “Could we all play a game later? Maybe?” she asked Stephen. She really loved watching Steven. He reminded her of the early days with Pink. While she hated the Pink that left her, she did sometimes long for the days when Pink was excited to play with her in the garden. Back before Pink was worried about colonies and being more mature.

Stephen looked at Spinel in shock at her question, but the look on her face made him nod his head. “Yeah, I think we could do that later. I know my younger self would probably be thrilled to play a game in outer space.” He told her, smiling.

Spinel tilted her head to the side, “Why does it matter when the game is played?” she asked, confused.

Steven smiled, “My younger self has never left Earth. He’s only heard stories about what’s beyond the planet from Pearl. At some point, Pearl tries to take me into space and it doesn’t end well, but it does make me wonder about space and what’s out there.” He told Spinel. “Plus, this probably reminds him of Cookie Cat, it’s a treat that we love.” He finished.

Spinel still looked confused, but she let it go. The only thing she understood was that Steven would be excited to play a game with her.

During Stephen and Spinel’s conversation, Steven had been busy asking the diamonds all sorts of silly questions. Some they laughed at while others they couldn’t answer because they didn’t understand the Earth meaning behind the question. Yellow decided it was time to move on when she noticed Stephen focusing back on Steven and the diamonds.

“Alright, I think it’s time to take a break from questions. I’m sure Stephen can help answer some of your questions that we couldn’t Steven.” Yellow told the young boy as nicely as she was able to.

Steven pouted but understood that they did come here to get help. “Okay…” he said.

“Now, I think we should prepare the two of you for the broadcast-” Yellow started.

“Whoa, broadcast? I thought you were going to ask certain gems to come here and see if they would be willing to help?” Stephen asked.

“That would take too long.” White explained, “It would be easier for you to just send out a broadcast, and then we could see who shows up to help.”

Stephen looked uncomfortable at this. The last time he did a broadcast, the whole Spinel thing happened. He wasn’t sure how comfortable he was broadcasting the fact that his younger, more vulnerable self was in the future with him.

Yellow noticed his expression and went to reassure him. “For this broadcast, it would just be you for now. You would explain that visitors from the past have shown up due to the timepiece made on Earth. You can ask for volunteers to help recreate the timepiece and offer those willing to help the chance to meet the visitors from the past. We will work out the fine details of the message in the broadcast room.” She explained to him.

Stephen let out a sigh of relief. That sounded more reasonable.

“I don’t understand the concern. We would have more gems show up if they could see that they would be helping your past self, but whatever makes you more comfortable Starlight.” White told the group. She really didn’t understand the secrecy, but if the others did then she must be missing something.

Stephen rolled his eyes but decided to stay quiet. He didn’t need to start anything with White right now.

The diamonds started walking to the broadcast room. As they walked, they showed off the building to both Stevens since it was even different from the last time Stephen had been there too.

As the diamonds showed off and preened under the compliments from Steven, Stephen wondered how the trip was going for the rest of their family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The part where Dewdrop is being teased about the old shirts Stephen used to wear is courtesy of my brother. When we watched Snow Day and we saw what looked like his old shirts my brother was like, “Why would she be folding his old shirts that he can’t even wear anymore?” So, I wanted to put in why I think she did it. 
> 
> I have decided to start changing some things, like White and Stephen's relationship. Also, how Stephen interacts with the diamonds and everyone. I'm trying to keep it subtle and not too out of character. I'm going off of how he acted in the movie when he got back home after the broadcast and was talking to Connie about the diamonds and the things he said to cactus Steven. So, I'm allowing him to be more truthful and blunt towards the gems when they say or do something that he doesn't like (for example, brushing off what happened to Spinel). He's not going to laugh it off or let it go. However, he's still his caring self who wants to help others but doesn't want to talk about his problems. All the trauma is still there.
> 
> Next time, we take a look at how the gems are doing :)
> 
> Stay safe everyone!


	7. Gem Adventure Time!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy crap! Okay, so first, sorry this took so long.  
> I had a lot of family issues pop up at once and I honestly didn't have the motivation to write many of those days. I think I remember saying that I hoped to get this chapter out soon because of quarantine and having a little more free time? Well! Life took that as a challenge and I lost lol.  
> More details at the end if you're interested. 
> 
> I sincerely hope my next post won't take this long! I'm not making any statements about it though because I don't want to jinx myself XD.
> 
> Second! I hope you enjoy :)  
> I tried to do my research but... if something isn't completely canon or doesn't line up with canon please suspend your disbelief and enjoy anyway :). I really tried, but dang. Keeping track of timelines has never been a strong suit of mine.

While Ame had become more mature over time, she still couldn’t help the excitement she felt at introducing her younger self to their extended family. It was a good thing that Stephen had called out to her to remind her of the Rose quartzes. That would’ve been  _ real _ awkward to deal with. Thankfully, the Famethyst knew how she felt about them and they usually steered clear of the Rose quartzes while she visited. It’s not like she didn’t like them… it was just still too hard to see them. There actually weren’t too many left on board the ship anymore. Many had gotten off on other planets to either stay or visit longer.

Once Ame was sure Amethyst would continue to follow her, she let go of Amethyst’s hand.

“Sooo, who are the Famethyst?” Amethyst asked her older self, walked beside her as they walked down a path.

“The Famethyst are our family!” Ame exclaimed, turning to look at her younger self. “Ya know the other holes around ours?  _ They _ are the other holes!”

“Whoa, what?” Amethyst asked, starting to understand why Ame was so excited. She had always dreamed of finding the others who were made with her.

“Yeah! And they are awesome! They helped us a lot back when the Diamonds were still evil and all. They risked a lot for us and the others.” Ame responded, a fond look on her face.

“They came to Earth to visit a while back and I’ve been trying to visit them too. I gotta wait for them to call me and let me know they landed on another planet though. Can’t exactly warp onto a moving ship.” Ame continued, laughing at the end.

“Wow… that’s great.” Amethyst said, feeling herself tear up. She was glad that she finally found others like her. Not that her family wasn’t great, especially now after that talk with Pearl, but it would still be nice to meet the gems who were also created on Earth.

Ame glanced sideways at Amethyst after her quiet response and smiled. She could guess how Amethyst was feeling right now.

The rest of the short walk was spent in companionable silence.

As they got closer to the ship, Ame could see Amethyst getting more and more excited.

“The ship’s HUGE!” Amethyst exclaimed as they reached the entrance from where it was docked.

“I know right?” Ame responded, “It  _ was _ a human zoo before, so it would have to be kinda big.” She explained.

“Wait, a  _ what _ ?” Amethyst asked, looking at Ame in shock.

“I thought Dewdrop and Steven explained that in their whole spiel about Rose being PD?” Ame asked her confused.

Amethyst blushed, “Oh... maybe… I did pay attention to a lot of it! But… I kinda wasn’t at some points?” she said, finishing off her last sentence as more of a question.

“Eh, yeah. It was kinda long.” Ame said, nodding her head. Even now, she had a hard time sitting still and paying attention for more than half an hour.

“Okay, long story short, Rose as PD told the diamonds she wanted to stop the colony to save the humans and so the diamonds made a zoo for humans. Like, not what she wanted. Then, after she was ‘shattered’,” Ame continued, doing quotation marks at the word shattered, “Blue Diamond kept the zoo in a weird homage to PD. Once the diamonds became good, the humans and our quartz family were free to do what they wanted on the ship. Oh yeah, the Famethyst were charged to look after the humans when PD was shattered. So, that’s why they are on the ship.” Ame explained.

“ _ Oh _ , okay. That makes sense then.” Amethyst said. “But wait, why do you call them the Famethyst?” she asked.

Ame looked at her and snorted, “Really? Why do you think so?” she asked, teasing Amethyst.

Amethyst stood there for a moment and thought. Then she gasped and looked at Ame. “Because they are our family and Amethysts?” she asked.

“Yep! Well, there are some Jaspers too and a Carnelian. But I just include them and they don’t seem to mind.” Ame told her.

Ame held her hand up to the wall and opened the door leading them into the ship. The gems on board had a routine and she knew how to avoid the Rose quartzes. She took Amethyst over to the control room that was still run by the humans from the zoo, also known as the Zoomans.

“Ah! You are the Amethyst that comes to visit the others, yes?” Wy-six asked Ame as the two walked in. Then he saw Amethyst and looked a little startled, “Oh, ah, I’m sorry but you two look the same.” He said bluntly.

“Heh, yep. 8XM here to visit the Famethyst! And this is a younger 8XM. Time travel and all. Can you let them know and send someone up?” Ame asked him. “This one,” she said pointing at Amethyst, “shouldn’t see some of our guests yet. I still want some things to be a surprise.”

Amethyst looked at Ame curiously, but she trusted her older self. Anyone else and she’d be running around trying to figure out who she shouldn’t meet yet.

Wy-six looked confused at Ame’s explanation, but he knew from her past visits that seeing the Rose quartzes made her uncomfortable. He didn’t understand why, but he trusted her and the other gems to know how to handle the situation. He still didn’t get why there were two of them in different clothes though.

“Okay, I’ll let them know.” He said with a smile and walked off to call one of the Amethysts.

“Whoa, this is insane!” Amethyst exclaimed as she looked at the humans walking around in weird clothes. 

“Heh, yeah. The humans here are getting better. They still aren’t like Earth humans though.” Ame told her.

Before either Amethyst could say anything else, they were both barreled into by a group of Amethysts.

“8XM! You’re back!” the group shouted as they held Ame up before noticing Amethyst.

“Whoa, why is there a younger version of yourself here?” 8XG asked, holding Amethyst up on her shoulder.

“Hey, how’d you know I was younger?” Amethyst asked them.

“Cause you look like you did when we first met ya.” A short Carnelian told her. “Well, kinda anyway. I think your outfit is a little different.”

“Ah! Carnie!” Ame shouted, jumping down from the amethysts that were holding her to grab the Carnelian, nicknamed Carnie, in a bear hug.

Carnie laughed and hugged her back just as tightly. “So, you wanna tell us what’s been going on?” she asked.

Ame smiled, “Heck ya! But, ya know… maybe somewhere else so the story isn’t interrupted?” she asked them.

They all looked at each other and could guess why she asked this. So, in true quartz fashion, Ame was grabbed up again and the two were led to the break room that the rest of the amethysts used to relax in.

After everyone was settled down with Ame and Amethyst sitting up higher than the rest with the others sitting on the floor cross-legged, Ame thanked them all. Then began to explain how her younger self was here with Amethyst interjecting every once in a while. The Famethyst were enraptured by her story.

“Wow, that’s so cool that we get to meet you before our past selves will meet you!” a skinny Jasper, nicknamed Skinny, told Amethyst.

“Heh, yeah. I was super excited to meet ya guys too when Ame told me where she was taking us.” Amethyst said, a little overwhelmed, but extremely happy to be meeting her family.

“That’s your nickname for 8XM right? So you guys have separate names to go by?” another amethyst asked from the back of the group.

“Yeah, I usually go by Amethyst on Earth and we couldn’t both be Amethyst. So, we came up with the name Ame for me! Just like how I gave some of you guys nicknames.” She told the group.

“That’s so cool!” another jasper shouted from the middle of the group.

“Maybe we should call you Ame and your younger self 8XM then?” Skinny asked them.

Ame and Amethyst looked at each other and grinned before facing the Famethyst again.

“That would be cool!” Amethyst told them, a feeling of warmth ran through her body and she truly felt like she belonged in this group now.

Ame glanced back over at her. She felt really happy for her younger self. Especially when she thought back to where she had been mentally and emotionally at this time.

She had still been trying to find her place and feel like she belonged with the crystal gems. Their talk of the war and how she was made had made her feel… less than… That was the only way she could think to describe it. Like, she had something to prove and she had to work to show them that she wasn’t a mistake. It caused her to lash out a lot, especially at Pearl who seemed to like nothing more than to shove her worthlessness back in her face. Of course, she knew now that Pearl had thought she was helping Amethyst by trying to teach her how to be more serious and mature; not really understanding her quartz nature.

Ame watched as the others gave Amethyst a quartz worthy welcome and smiled. She was glad to help her younger self find her self-worth sooner than she had. Amethyst spotted Ame looking at her and beckoned her over. Ame ran over to the group once it was safe to do so after Amethyst’s welcome.

“Okay… okay. So, these guys were just telling me that the last time you visited you….” Amethyst, or 8XM as the others were now calling her, started, using her arms to wildly exaggerate whatever it was the other gems had told her.

Ame let out a laugh at the story Amethyst recited back to her. “Okay, now wait a sec. If we are gonna talk about this story then let’s not forget Carnie and Skinny’s role in this!” She exclaimed, which had the rest of the Famethyst rolling with laughter as the two who had been called out tried to defend themselves.

The group playfully shoved each other, each gem trying to top each other’s stories to impress Amethyst as Amethyst laughed and exclaimed at the more scandalous stories they told her.

‘ _ Yep, this is perfect.’  _ Ame thought to herself as she joined in on the stories, much to Amethyst’s delight.

\----

Dewdrop held Pearl’s hand until she felt like they were far enough away that her younger self wouldn’t be tempted to run back. She forgot how obsessed she was with keeping Steven safe and protecting him. Not that she wasn’t anymore, she still cared deeply about Stephen and wanted him to be safe and happy. However, he had proved time and time again to be capable of looking out for himself. She trusted him when he said he was doing fine or didn’t need help. Although… lately…

She shook her head. Now wasn’t the time for that. She had to keep her younger self’s mind off of Steven. She led Pearl through some hallways and as everything turned pink, she heard Pearl gasp softly. She wasn’t surprised. She  _ was  _ leading her through Rose’s old rooms. They stopped at a smaller door that was farther away from Rose’s main rooms. ‘ _ Stephen’s rooms now.’  _ She thought to herself. She knocked on the door and opened it after she heard an invite on the other side.

Pearl was nervous. She wasn’t sure what Dewdrop was up to, but it made her slightly uncomfortable to be in Rose’s/Pink Diamond’s old living space. She had great and terrible memories of this place. She trusted Dewdrop though, after all, it was her future self. She wouldn’t purposely do something to hurt her. She watched Dewdrop knock on the door and heard a soft, bubbly voice invite them in. Dewdrop smiled and opened the door, encouraging Pearl to walk in with her.

Pearl stepped in alongside Dewdrop and gasped, hands going up to cover her mouth. She wasn’t able to keep the shock off her face as she stared at a Pearl that she had only seen drenched in white while serving White Diamond. However, she wasn’t white anymore. She was multiple shades of pink that reminded her so much of the colors Rose wore as Pink Diamond. She had heard stories from the other pearls that this one had once served Pink, but something had happened and she was no longer fit to serve a diamond. She had been confused when she occasionally saw her doing tasks for White Diamond, but it hadn’t been her place to question it and the other pearls had been tight-lipped about the whole thing. She did notice that the cracks that once covered the left side of her face seemed to only cover her eye now.

Finally, she was able to calm herself and she blushed. Her hands moved to fix her outfit nervously. “Oh, dear! I’m so sorry. That was so rude of me…” she said frantically, her eyes looking everywhere but at the pink pearl. Her hands moved to twist her ribbon once more.

The pearl in front of her let out a soft giggle. “Oh dear me. It’s nothing.” She started, waving a hand. “I have to say this is  _ quite _ the surprise. Is this who you were talking about earlier, Pearl?” she asked, looking at Dewdrop.

Pearl jerked her head up at the sound of her name before realizing that she was talking to Dewdrop.

Dewdrop let out a nervous laugh. “Yes, I didn’t realize quite how extreme her reaction would be. Sorry about that, both of you.” She said looking embarrassed. “Volley, this is my past self. She’s going by Pearl for now while my nickname is Dewdrop. Just so it isn’t confusing.” She told Volley.

Volley smiled, her eyes lighting up. “Oh! Did Steven come up with the nicknames? That would be so like him.” She said happily.

Pearl didn’t think she had ever met a bubblier gem in her life. How she was so… happy with the past she had was beyond her.

“Yes.” Dewdrop said, smiling, “It was actually his past self. Our Steven is going by Stephen now. Garnet’s nickname is Crimson and Amethyst’s nickname is Ame. Just while our past selves are here.”

“Oh, that’s so great. Please, you have to let me call you Dewdrop after they leave! The name fits you so well.” Volley said coming up to Pearl and looping arms with her.

Dewdrop blushed and looked away. “I am becoming quite fond of the nickname. It might stick around. I’m sure Bismuth will get a kick out of it.” She said, smiling.

“Oh! She doesn’t know yet?” Volley asked, surprised. She knew Pearl visited Bismuth’s classes quite a bit to help out.

“No, she was helping keep our past selves a secret until we figured out what to do.” Dewdrop told her.

As Pearl listened to them talk, she smiled to herself. It was nice to see her older self having others to talk to, especially another pearl. She wasn’t sure about the relationship her older self had with Yellow Pearl and Blue Pearl now, but it was nice to see she could get along with Rose’s old pearl. It wasn’t that she didn’t love the other crystal gems, but it felt like she constantly had to prove that she was so much more than a pearl. Even if they accepted her as she is, she still felt like she had to work to keep up the image she built for herself. She didn’t have to do that with other pearls. They all had an understanding and bond with each other that most gems couldn’t understand. She had missed Yellow and Blue when she left with Rose, even if they hated her now for leaving.

She let the two have their moment before she interrupted, “Did you bring me to meet her because of what we talked about earlier?” she asked Dewdrop.

Dewdrop startled. She hadn’t forgotten about her younger self, but she had gotten caught up in her conversation with Volley.

Volley laughed, smiling at the two of them. “Were you talking about me?” she asked, teasing Dewdrop.

Dewdrop smiled, a little embarrassed. “Oh, yes… well. It has to do with you and I wanted your permission before I shared anything with my younger self.” Dewdrop started. “When I was explaining Rose’s history to our past selves; I mentioned that I knew what had happened to you and it made my past self curious.”

Volley smiled, amused. “Oh yes, I seem to remember your reaction to me being very interesting when we first met.” She said, teasing Dewdrop once more.

Dewdrop blushed this time. “Oh, really?” she asked, “Well, anyway” she started, trying to move the conversation away from her embarrassing behavior when she first met Volley properly. “I wanted to ask for your permission to discuss your past with Pearl. I know we are technically the same person and she can understand as I did, but it would still be sharing it with someone else.”

Volley looked at Dewdrop fondly. “That’s so sweet,” she said and grabbed Dewdrop’s hands. “Of course, you can share our story with your past self. Maybe it’ll help not only her but  _ my _ past self too when they meet again. I’ll even help! Garnet- Oh wait!  _ Crimson _ told me it was good to talk it out with others.” She continued. “Come, let’s sit down and talk.” She said as she released one of Dewdrop’s hands to grab one of Pearl’s hands. Bringing them over to sit down on a pile of pink pillows she had picked out. She just loved Earth’s creativity and inventions. When she was offered a room here by Steven, or Stephen now, and the other diamonds she definitely wanted to bring in some of Earth’s creations. She wasn’t here too often anymore. She had her own little place back on Earth in Little Homeworld too. She loved helping with the classes and seeing gems partaking in things they never would have been able to before. However, it was nice to have this room as an escape from it all when it got to be too much.

She got comfortable on a pillow pile and allowed the other two pearls to do that same. “Now, I think I’ll let you start Dewdrop so I know how much Pearl knows. Then I can chime right in when I want to!” Volley said with a smile, staring expectantly at Dewdrop. 

Pearl also turned to look at Dewdrop, curious to know what happened to Volley.

Dewdrop smiled, a little nervous. She took a deep breath. “Okay, well… like I said before, we had been talking about Rose and her former identity as Pink Diamond. I brought up the fact that something had happened to you.” She said nodding at Volley.

“I think the best way to reveal this is to start at the beginning when I learned about this. Volley had visited Stephen hoping he could fix the cracks on her face. Stephen develops Rose’s healing powers later on.” She added at the end when she saw Pearl’s confused face. Pearl nodded her head in understanding.

Dewdrop continued, “Stephen wasn’t able to fix the cracks and so I brought up the reef. We headed there to see if that would help and that’s when I learned…” Dewdrop trailed off. It was still hard to think about. Gems usually didn’t change much, at least they didn’t before now. It had been hard to think about Rose being anything but the kind, inquisitive healer that she was when Dewdrop had met her.

“Would you like me to take over from here?” Volley asked softly. She understood Dewdrop’s feelings after fusing with her. Rose was a complicated topic for both of them.

Dewdrop nodded, grateful. “Yes… it’s- It’s just… it’s still hard to think of what I learned. I think I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. How silly.” She said and felt tears building up but she refused to let them fall. Instead, she quickly wiped them away.

Volley got up to wrap Dewdrop in a hug. “I know… I’m sorry.”

Dewdrop jerked back to look at Volley. “What! Why are you sorry?” Dewdrop said, surprised. “You have nothing to be sorry about!”

Volley smiled softly, “I know.” Then she sat back suddenly, grinning. “Oh! Dewdrop I have a great idea!”

Dewdrop stared at her, a little shocked by her sudden exclamation. “Yes?”

“Why don’t we let Mega Pearl tell your past self about what happened?” she asked, smiling.

Dewdrop laughed, “That actually sounds like a wonderful idea.”

Pearl watched them and finally found a moment to speak up. “Wait, you two have fused?” Pearl asked, surprised. She recognized that fusion was more widely used now, but she was surprised that their relationship was already deep enough to be able to fuse so freely.

Dewdrop turned and smiled at Pearl, “Yes! It was to escape the reef actually, but we have fused since then. It’s helped us both.”

Dewdrop turned back to Volley and held out her hand. “Shall we?”

Volley nodded, smiling brightly.

A bright light filled the room and slowly a figure formed about twice as tall as Pearl. Pearl watched on, amazed. It wasn’t every day you got to see your future self fused with someone. Normally this wasn’t something you could experience from the outside.

The gem that stood before her was beautiful. The two pearls’ colors compliment one another, and the gem’s outfit reminded her of a human’s military uniform. The gem crouched down and smiled, “Nice to meet you Pearl, my name is Mega Pearl. Courtesy of Stephen of course,” she said laughing lightly.

Pearl could admit she was a little starstruck and took a second to answer her. “Nice to meet too,” she said, smiling. “It’s quite odd to meet a fusion that you’re technically a part of.” She mused.

Mega Pearl smiled and nodded, “It is odd to see a component of myself on the outside like this.” she said in agreement. “Come, let’s sit down. I have much to tell you.”

Pearl nodded and they both got comfortable again. Mega Pearl launched into the tale of how the two met and what they learned of Rose. When Mega Pearl was done, she looked down at Pearl and waited for her to get her bearings.

“So, Rose… She really hurt you?” She asked tentatively. If it hadn’t come from a fusion that her future self was a part of, she probably would have put up a fight over it. In fact, it sounds like that’s exactly what her future self did.

Mega Pearl nodded her head and she took both of Pearl’s hands into her own. “Yes, but she also hurt you and Dewdrop. Maybe not physically, but the hurt doesn’t have to be physical. It took the two of us fusing to understand Rose completely.” She said as she let go of Pearl’s hand.

She raised one hand in front of her, “Dewdrop and you knew that Rose wanted to change, but you didn’t understand why.” She said and held out her other hand, “Volley never expected Pink to change at all.” She continued and held her hands together, “Together, I understand the whole picture now.” Mega Pearl dropped her hands to her lap.

“It’s okay to feel hurt by Rose and still miss her. It’s okay to acknowledge what happened and how it made you feel. That hurt may never go away, but we have each other to get through it. I hope you can take this understanding back with you and when you meet Volley for the first time maybe you can help her and yourself sooner.” Mega Pearl explained.

Pearl stared down at her lap and clenched her fists. It hurt to think that Rose was capable of these things, but she had also seen Stephen’s episodes which seemed to be very familiar to the episodes that Rose used to have according to Volley’s past with her. She didn’t think anyone else noticed, but after Stephen turned pink the place he was standing, or if he was holding anything, had cracks around it. Nothing huge and noticeable, but she had grown concerned for him and Steven’s future during those moments. It seemed like he was struggling. Was it the same thing? Or were his episodes caused by something else? Even though he was from the future and Steven was her first concern, she couldn’t help but worry since Stephen is what Steven would become.

She took a deep breath, “I think it will take me a while to accept all of this.” Pearl said.

Mega Pearl nodded, “Well, you are already taking it better than Dewdrop did.” she said with a teasing smile on her lips.

Pearl gave a small smile in return but lost it after a moment as she looked back down at her bow, “I… do have one question…” she said as she tried to figure out how to word it.

“Yes?” Mega Pearl asked.

“Are… I’ve noticed that Stephen lately… he seems to be having… issues that sound similar to how Pink acted before meeting me and Dewdrop. Do you think these episodes of his are similar to these powers that Rose used to use?” she asked.

Mega Pearl’s face fell and concern began to show. “I… don’t know. Volley’s memories say yes but-and even if they are-“ she tried to explain, but it became hard, and suddenly Dewdrop and Volley were left standing where Mega Pearl was.

Pearl gasped, “Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to make you unfuse!”

“No, it’s fine.” Dewdrop said. “We just had conflicting thoughts on this and we thought it would be better to unfuse for now. Honestly…” she started, frowning in concern, “I’m not sure what is happening with him, but he says he has it under control…” she told Pearl.

Pearl looked at her with wide eyes, “But does he?” she asked quickly, baffled by her future self’s answer. That didn’t sound like she would handle Steven’s problems.

Dewdrop frowned, “I’ve begun to wonder… But he has really proven himself, Pearl! I learned I couldn’t keep ‘smothering’ him. His words, not mine.” She explained. “He has done amazing things that none of us, including Rose, thought was possible.”

“Okay? That doesn’t mean he’s right or that it’s right to ignore what’s happening to him even if he thinks he has it under control!” Pearl said freaking out. She turned to Volley, “What do you think?”

Volley looked startled to be brought into this. “Well, that episode at the reef was very much like Pink…” she said nervously. “I don’t know how he’s been handled by you two in the past, but he seemed to be very distraught over what happened there and we never really addressed it with him.” Volley continued and looked over at Dewdrop during the last part of her sentence.

Dewdrop frowned and fidgeted with her jacket. “I…” she started and stopped, looking down at her hands. “Maybe you’re right…”

Volley let the uncomfortable silence go for a moment before she couldn’t take it anymore. “Well, there’s nothing to be done about it at the moment. Maybe once you are done here, I can go back to Earth with you and we can sit down and talk with him about it? It sounds like he might not want to address it with you, Pearl, or the others. We should figure out why.”

Dewdrop nodded, “You’re right.” She did her best to smile, “Let’s enjoy the time we have here together and we can talk with Stephen later, together.”

Pearl and Volley nodded. Although Pearl still looked concerned, Volley did her best to change the topic. “Let me show you around Pink’s old rooms, some changes have been made. Oh! I could show you Stephen’s room!” Volley said excitedly as she led them out of her room.

This got Pearl to laugh as Dewdrop and she followed Volley out. Volley started to give them a tour, exaggerating any tales she told along the way. Before long the three of them were enjoying each other’s company and laughing as they walked along the halls of Pink’s old home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, at least everything is going well for the gems! :)
> 
> I might be getting another chapter done for my other story first (sorry...). I'm trying to get all the ideas out of my head so it'll focus on this story instead of going "OH, what would happen if Lars and Sadie went to the past with Steven? Omg, could you imagine the reactions of the gems?", etc. 
> 
> Details:  
> I basically became a caretaker for my mom and my two cats. My mom is better now but she's just now getting off of bed rest (not the virus thankfully but it was still bad). My two cats both had issues and so I was taking them back and forth to the vets for a second. Plus, my mom's appointments and getting her what she needs. And I was still wrapping up my teaching job for the year lol. So... yep.  
> My teaching job is done until August now and I'm back to working at my retail job until then.


	8. Let's Play, Spinel!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, okay. I know it's been a while! So sorry!  
> While I expected this one to take longer, I did not think it would be THIS long.   
> Lemme tell ya if you are still in school doing online learning or have kids doing online learning... 
> 
> PLEASE have patience with your teachers. Most of us (emphasis on most... not all, unfortunately) care and we are just as stressed and confused as you. We found out what we would be using for our online students two weeks before school started, couldn't even get on until a week before school, and THEN they switched it on us so we had two days to figure stuff out.   
> I'm honestly still learning how to juggle online vs. in-person students and I have been exhausted. So, this was put on hold until I could actually get home at a decent hour and stay awake enough to write. 
> 
> So, I hope you enjoy this chapter :)  
> Please let me know if I mixed up Stephen and Steven at all. I tried to pay attention and my beta DekuEAM did an awesome job as always, but mistakes are always possible!

Chapter 8: Let’s Play, Spinel!

Steven looked around excitedly from White’s hand as they walked into the broadcasting room, holding onto one of her fingers for balance. “Whoa… this place looks so cool!” he exclaimed, stars dancing in his eyes. “It’s like a smaller version of that big room we just left!”

Stephen smiled at Steven’s excitement and asked Blue to put him down. Blue frowned at him in reluctance, but she understood he needed to get ready for the announcement.

Stephen went to talk to the two Pearls that used to belong to Yellow and Blue while Steven continued with his questions; the diamonds were more than happy to try and answer all of them. 

The two Pearls usually stuck around Homeworld when not visiting Earth. They were still exploring their options.  _ Now that they have options. _ Last time he had checked up with them, Blue Pearl was really getting into her art and expanding to other art forms on Earth. Yellow Pearl was experimenting with a few different jobs and hobbies. She still loved to model for Blue Pearl and the other gems, but she had been interested in gardening lately. Even though they were involved in other interests, both of them were still more than happy to help out with tasks like this while they trained new gems who were interested in working as a sort of secretary for the diamonds. 

When he was still helping the diamonds dismantle everything, he only lasted a week before he came up with nicknames for the two of them. It got really annoying having to constantly call them Blue Pearl or Yellow Pearl. So, Blue Pearl became BP and Yellow Pearl became Canary. The two decided to keep their nicknames when introducing themselves to others; even if it took Canary a month before she accepted such a weird Earth name from Stephen. He could admit now that the nicknames were… not his best work, just like Volley, but the names stuck and they seemed to enjoy having a unique name.

He explained his plan to the two of them as he looked around the room. Since the throne room was open to all gems now. They had recreated a similar room for any broadcasts they still did. It was kinda cool to see a room look like a mini copy of the throne room.

“We’re ready when you are Ste-Stephen,” BP told him, still getting used to his own nickname he had told them about. Stephen smiled and thanked her before running over to the diamonds and Steven.

“Okay guys, BP and Canary are ready to go.” He told them all, turning to his younger self. “Steven, I want you to go over and watch how the two of them work the broadcasting system, okay? I don’t want gems to know about you until I’ve had a chance to see who is willing to help.” Stephen explained.

Steven pouted a little, but it didn’t last since he was excited to see how the broadcast was done. He ran over to the pearls, already asking questions.

Stephen sighed and smiled at his rambunctious younger self and turned back to the diamonds. “Are you going to sit or stand with me?” he asked them.

“Well, of course, Starlight!” White told him, smiling. “Since you are so worried about the help you may receive, I think if I stand with you, it’ll attract the right sort of gems.” She told him, trying to be reassuring.

“Uh, thanks… I think.” Stephen responded, turning to the other two.

“Of course, we’ll all be backing you, Stephen. Us diamonds stick together. You were the one who kept telling us we had to show a united front, correct?” Yellow asked him.

“Heh, yeah… I did say that huh?” Stephen said, rubbing the back of his neck with a blush.

“Don’t worry Stephen, you’ll do great,” Blue told him, ruffling his hair with a finger as Spinel sat, oddly quiet, on her shoulder.

Stephen wondered if Spinel was thinking back to his last broadcast. He knew she understood why he was so anxious about this.

Stephen took a deep breath and faced the cameras as the diamonds sat down. He looked at the Pearls and waited for the count down that would tell him when they were recording.

He smiled, “Hello again!” he started. His broadcast went on to explain how an hourglass, the same ones formerly thought to be useless for extended time travel, dropped off a few visitors from the past. He explained that he and the rest of the diamonds were requesting help to figure out how to send the visitors back home. Any help was welcome, but especially any gems who worked at the base for Pink Diamond and helped work, or do research, on the hourglasses. He also explained his experience with an hourglass back when he was younger and how it was different from the ones the diamonds on Homeworld had before discontinuing the project. “So, please, if you would like to help us figure out how Pink Diamond’s hourglasses work, meet in the former throne room in 10 earth hours.” Stephen finished.

He sighed in relief when BP gave him the signal that they had stopped recording. As much as he loved talking to people and gems, giving a speech was  _ not  _ easy. He turned and smiled at the diamonds. “Thanks again for the help.” He told them. He had to give them some credit; they had come a long way from how they used to act back when he first met them.

“Always happy to help Stephen!” Blue told him, smiling gently.

Spinel dropped down from Blue’s shoulder to bounce next to Stephen. “You did great!” she told him, almost shyly before she took off to meet Steven halfway from where he, and the pearls, were walking away from the screens. Well, the pearls were walking. Steven looked like he was struggling not to run and was almost bouncing as he walked closer to them.

Steven smiled at Spinel and enthusiastically agreed to be carried over to Stephen and the diamonds when Spinel offered. Spinel picked him up and bounced back over to Stephen where she placed Steven down.

Steven stared up at Stephen with stars in his eyes, “That was sooo cool! BP and Canary told me that the message went out to alllll the gems in the whole universe!” Steven told him excitedly, his arms stretched out as he emphasized the word ‘all’.

Stephen chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck, “Heh yeah. It’s pretty cool.”

“ _ So _ , now that you took care of that…. Could we play a game?” Spinel asked, hesitating on asking the question before taking the plunge and just asking it.

“OH, OH, OH! Can we? Please?” Steven asked Stephen and the diamonds. He was jumping up and down in excitement.

“Of course, Starlight,” White told Steven, looking down fondly at him. “We have some work to catch up on. We’ll come back for you three in say… an hour?” White asked Stephen, even though it sounded more like a statement.

“Sounds good,” Stephen replied, quite aware that it wasn’t really a question. If he really wanted to, he could probably argue for more hours, but it was really a battle worth winning.

“Oh! Maybe when we come back, we can all play a game together.” Blue told them all. “It’s been so long since we’ve done that.”

Yellow smiled at Blue and looked curiously at White. She must’ve seen what she expected and turned back to Blue, “That sounds like a good idea Blue.” Yellow told her as the three diamonds started walking out of the room.

Stephen resisted rolling his eyes, ‘Gee, thanks for asking.’ He thought sarcastically. It wasn’t like he would’ve said no, especially with his past self’s excitement at the idea. However, it would be nice to be included in decisions and his opinion more appreciated. It was something else he was still working with them on. Even though they took him more seriously now, they still sometimes reverted to treating him like they treated Pink.

He pushed the thoughts aside and turned to Steven and Spinel. Steven looked excited to be playing a game in space which he made clear by loudly vocalizing the opinion. Spinel looked excited but kept glancing at Stephen warily… or maybe she looked worried?

Stephen smiled, “Okay, what are we going to play?” he asked them.

“Oh! We could teach Spinel how to play Steven Tag!” Steven told him then looked conflicted for a moment. “Oh… unless… did you teach her how to play already?” Steven asked.

“Heh, no. We met not too long ago and haven’t had time to play games.” He told Steven, just barely stopping a grimace from appearing on his face.

Spinel wasn’t so well versed in keeping expressions off her face and she frowned. She rubbed her arm.

Steven looked between Stephen and Spinel, frowning. He felt like he was missing something here… So, he was just going to have to make sure they both had fun! “Oh! Well, that’s okay then! We could teach her to play Steven Tag or… Maybe Spinel has some fun games she can teach us how to play!” Steven told them, hyping up his cheerful attitude and smiling at them both.

Stephen looked at his younger self with worry. ‘Great, am I causing him to worry about me already?’ he thought to himself. He recognized what Steven was doing. It was and still is, something he would do to distract others from their problems or try to cheer them up. It usually worked to distract them from what they were upset about or it helped them open up about what was bothering them.

Spinel recognized the tactic as well. It was very similar to what Stephen did for her when he got his powers back. She took a deep breath and smiled back at Steven. “I’d be willing to learn a new game! Sounds interestin’. I also know lotsa games I used to play with-“ Spinel started and stopped. Pink Diamond was a sensitive subject for both her and Stephen; maybe even Steven. It took her a while to figure out, but she began to understand that Stephen had some complicated feelings about Pink Diamond similar to her own feelings. “Ahh…” she continued for a moment, thinking of how to phrase it, “other gems.” She finished lamely.

Steven stood there thinking. Things were  _ way _ too tense and he didn’t quite understand why it was happening. “I’d love to learn more about gem games!” he told them. It might be the better option since Stephen didn’t look too thrilled to play Steven Tag.

“Great!” Spinel said, finally getting excited as she glanced at Stephen. He too looked a little interested at the opportunity.

“I’ve got the perfect one to start out with!” she told them. “It’s called…” she started and gave herself a drum roll. “Gem Tag!” she finished, yelling it out. She quickly continued to explain the game, “It’s like tag except gem powers are allowed. Also, if someone gets close to tagging you then right before they touch you, you can shout ‘Diamonds’! When you do that, the person who is it has to stop and do the diamond salute.” She explained and showed Steven the salute.

“Oh! I’ve seen that before! A lot of the gems outside were doing that when we first got here!” Steven told her.

“Well, duh. You and Stephen are diamonds. It’s not required, but people still do it out of respect.” Spinel told him.

“Ohhhh.” Steven replied, understanding a little more now.

“Any other rules?” Stephen asked, trying to get the explanation back on track. He’d rather not talk about politics right now.

“Oh, right!” Spinal said, laughing nervously. “Umm… Oh! While the person, who is it, is doing the diamond salute, they have to count down from 10 out loud before they can go back to playing. So, you can get as far away as possible or come up with a strategy while they are counting.” She finished.

“That sounds like fun! But… ah… I can’t really use a lot of my powers…” Steven explained, frowning.

“That’s alright! Just use what you have and take advantage of the diamond salute! Since me and Stephen have the advantage of powers, how about we can’t use the diamond salute on you when you’re it?” she asked him.

“That sounds fair!” Steven started and looked at Stephen, “As long as you are okay with it?” he asked him.

“Oh yeah, of course!” Stephen told him. He was just happy that Steven didn’t look worried anymore. The kid definitely didn’t need him adding to his worries.

“Hmm, okay… Who wants to be it first?” Spinel asked them.

“Oh! Oh!” Steven started, jumping up and down. “Let’s play rock, paper, scissors to decide! That way Spinel gets to learn an Earth game too.” Steven told them, proud of himself for coming up with the idea.

Stephen smiled, “That’s a great idea.” He told Steven. They then turned to Spinel and explained the directions. It took a minute because she didn’t understand how paper could beat rock.

The three played the game until it was decided that Steven would be it first. Stephen and Spinel looked at each other and silently agreed to tone down their abilities for Steven.

“Okay, I’ll count to five!” Steven told them and began to count.

Stephen and Spinel glanced at each other again and put some distance between themselves and Steven. Hopefully, enough so it wouldn’t be too hard but not too little that he would feel insulted.

Steven got to five and stood there for a moment, thinking. He glanced at Spinel and Stephen. He kind of knew how his future self might react, so it would be more exciting to see what Spinel would do. He nodded to himself as solidified his choice to go after Spinel.

Steven smiled and turned to run right at Spinel.

Spinel yelped and laughed with excitement. She had been sure that Steven would go after Stephen first. She kept forgetting the two’s personalities were almost completely different from each other. She let Steven get a little closer before she turned to run to the right. She was stopped by a shield sailing past her and she glanced at Steven smiling. “Oh yeah?” she asked and stretched out her limbs to avoid Steven who had caught up to her. She then used her limbs to form springs and spring away.

Steven paused for a moment to marvel at Spinel’s abilities. “So cool!” he whispered to himself with stars in his eyes.

Stephen was chuckling to himself, still standing in the same spot as he watched how surprised Spinel was by Steven’s quick thinking. He watched Spinel bounce away and glanced at Steven who was now… looking at him. “My turn, huh?” he asked himself as Steven came running towards him. Stephen smiled and used his floating abilities to bounce  _ just  _ above Steven’s head, giving Steven a chance to tag him.

What Stephen wasn’t expecting was for Steven to form a bubble which knocked Stephen off course and sent him tumbling to the ground, landing on his stomach. ‘ _ Crap, I forgot I had my bubble already!’ _ he thought to himself but was also pretty proud of his younger self for coming up with that idea. As he was thinking this, he felt a tag on his back.

“TAG! YOU’RE IT!” Steven shouted, giggling as he took off.

Stephen smirked and launched himself up into the air with his floating powers again. He looked around and spotted Spinel standing where she had landed after bouncing off.

Spinel squeaked when she saw Stephen focus in on her.

Stephen landed, adjusted his feet, and kicked off in Spinel’s direction. He came flying towards her and she jumped into the air to avoid him. Stephen readjusted and landed, digging his feet into the ground which caused him to sink into it. He focused and pointed his hand at the space above her and a shield formed right above where she was heading.

“YES!” he shouted, pumping his fists into the air. He was excited that it had worked. He wasn’t sure if it was possible for him to create a shield so far away from him, but he decided to take a risk since he could do very similar things to that.

Spinel gasped, not expecting that. It wasn’t something she had seen him do before. She used her hands to hit the shield first and used the force of her hitting the shield to spring herself back towards the ground. Then, she stretched out her arms to hit the ground and force her body to fly away from Stephen.

During this time, Steven was frozen at his spot. He was watching them in awe and wasn’t even upset that Stephen hadn’t tried to come and tag him yet.

Stephen watched where Spinel was going to land and waited, timing it out. Once the timing was right, he sent a shield skidding across the ground similar to what he would do to ride his shield like a sled except he wasn’t on it this time. He curved it just right and Spinel, not having enough time to see it coming, landed on the shield that then turned back towards where Stephen was.

Spinel yelled out in shock but started giggling, not even trying to get out this time.

Once Spinel was close enough, Stephen jumped towards Spinel and tagged her. “You’re it!” he shouted at her, smiling. He was actually really enjoying himself. Steven was a good buffer for the two of them, even if he hated that Steven had to be a buffer. Things were just so awkward between the two of them. She had attacked him and he had essentially pushed her onto the diamonds so he could ignore all of them for a while. To just be able to… enjoy each other’s company was great. He landed near Steven who was clapping at the display.

Spinel stayed on the shield until it came to a stop and disappeared, “Wowie, that was fun!” she said giggling as she stood up. She turned to look at the two of them, pretending to think, “Hmmm….”.

She watched as Steven started giggling at her actions and smiled to herself. Being able to play like this was just so fulfilling. She loved the diamonds, really, but they wouldn’t play games like this with her. They would watch her play or act and they would talk with her, but none of them could seem to bring themselves to relax and just be silly. Not like Pink… used to do. To be able to do what she was made for, and what she enjoyed doing, was nice.

She smiled as an idea formed in her head. She started running towards them and jumped into the air, forming herself into a ball that landed and rolled at them.

The two Stevens jumped out of her way but didn’t run when they noticed she stayed as a ball as she rolled to a stop. The two looked at each other before glancing back at Spinel. In their confusion, Spinel exploded back into her regular shape and stretched her arms towards both of them, hoping to catch one of them off guard.

“Diamonds!” Steven shouted, giggling as he ran away. Stephen laughed as well and he ran in the opposite direction.

Spinel pouted for a moment, but she couldn’t stop her smile as she brought her hands back towards herself to form the salute. She counted down from ten before looking around for both of them.

Their game of diamond tag continued for the whole hour. Then the two Steven’s needed to rest while they waited for the diamonds to come back. They all sat down while the two rested.

“That was so much fun!” Steven told them happily. “We need to do that again sometime!”

Stephen smiled at his younger self, “We’ll see, it depends on how long it’ll take to get you guys back to your time.” He told Steven.

Spinel watched the two of them. She was happy, but she felt sad too. She was happy that she got a chance to play with them, but she felt like Stephen would go back to ignoring her after Steven was gone.

“Did you have fun too, Spinel?” Steven asked her.

She startled and glanced at Steven, not realizing she had gotten lost in thought. She really looked at Steven and realized he looked concerned. “Huh, oh yeah. I had loads of fun!” she told him, smiling.

Steven smiled back and they fell into a comfortable silence.

“We’re back!” White exclaimed as the three diamonds entered the room. She tsked when she saw the mess they made in the room, but she ignored it and focused on the three of them who began to stand up. “Did you three have fun?” she asked them.

“Oh, yes! We played Gem Tag!” Steven told them, smiling with stars in his eyes. “It was  _ so fun _ !” he shouted, jumping up and down.

Blue smiled at Steven’s enthusiasm. “We decided that we should teach you to play the game Takeover,” Blue told him. “We’ve taught Stephen and Spinel how to play. It was made by one of our commanders a few months after we gave everyone the freedom to do what they wanted to do.” She explained.

Steven looked excited and glanced at Spinel and Stephen to share in the excitement.

Except, when he looked at them, they both had grimaces on their faces. They cleared their faces when they saw Steven glance at them. None of the diamonds were watching them as they had all eyes on Steven. Steven kept a smile on his face despite the lack of enthusiasm from Spinel, who seemed to love all games. Stephen could be explained away as not wanting to spend time with the diamonds, but it was concerning that not even Spinel was thrilled. He looked back up at the diamonds with a stiff smile, “That sounds... fun!” he told them, trying to sound excited, even though he was hesitant now. It couldn’t be that bad, could it?

\--

A few hours later Steven could say, with certainty, that Takeover was the least fun game in all of space.

Stephen had finally taken pity on Steven and chased off the diamonds, telling them that the two of them needed rest. It was true that Steven probably needed rest after that game. It was worse than any military board game on Earth; board games were already their least favorite type of game. Plus, Steven looked similar to how Stephen had looked after staying up to prove he had seen something in the warp stream.

Spinel stayed by telling the diamonds that she wanted to see how sleep worked for humans. None of the diamonds could fake enough interest in that and therefore had no plausible excuse to stay.

Once the three diamonds finally made their way out, after much stalling, the three of them headed to Stephen’s room and relaxed on his big bed. It was a bed that would’ve been big enough to fit all of the crystal gems plus a couple more gems/humans.

The two Stevens and Spinel talked for a while as they all relaxed from the mind-numbing game they had just sat through. Once Steven started yawning, and his eyes started drooping, Stephen helped him into some pajamas and into bed. Then it was just the two of them still awake.

Stephen looked awkwardly at Spinel. Feeling weird without their Steven buffer. And wasn’t that terrible?

Spinel didn’t look any better though. “So…” she started and trailed off. All previous conversation, having been started by Steven, came to a halt.

Stephen chuckled awkwardly, “Heh, yeah…” he started, “So, um….” He trailed off again. He couldn’t remember what they had already talked about. He had asked her how she was doing earlier, right?

Before the silence got any worse, he jumped up and off the bed from where he had been sitting by Steven. “Ah… I’m just gonna… get changed.” He said and rushed out of the room. When he came back in, Spinel was still sitting where he left her.

“You know, you don’t have to stay right?” he asked her.

“Huh? Oh, yeah… I know.” Spinel said, “I just wanna… is that okay?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah. Um, sure.” He said, crawling into bed. They had a big day ahead of them tomorrow with sorting through gems that came to help. However, he was too anxious to fall asleep right away with Spinel in the room. Thankfully, he normally only got around four to five hours of sleep anyway. It seemed to work for him since any more or less just made him feel tired. So, he would still be able to get the required amount of sleep once he was able to fall asleep.

Spinel watched as Stephen seemed to fall into a fitful sleep. She sat on a chair away from the bed now, having moved there after Steven got up to change for bed. She watched the two of them sleep. And sleep really was weird, but it looked… nice. She wasn’t sure why, but she was content to just watch over them. You would think, being her gem type and how she was left by Pink, that she wouldn’t want to stay still any longer than necessary. This was different somehow…

\--

Spinel shook Stephen awake a few hours later. “Hey… the diamonds just sent a message letting us know the first helpers have arrived.” She told Stephen as he groggily rubbed his eyes.

Stephen yawned, “Thanks Spinel.” He said as he got out of bed carefully. He wanted Steven to be able to sleep in longer. “Have any of the other gems come back yet?” he asked.

“Nah, not yet. But I think the Pearls are in Volley’s room. I heard talking in there earlier when I passed by. I haven’t seen either of the Amethyst’s though.” She told him. For once, they were able to have a comfortable conversation. Even if it was just to relay information.

“Thanks,” he told her, giving her a small smile as he went to change for the day. When he came back he looked over at Steven, contemplating something. “Hey, Spinel… would you be willing to watch over Steven for me while I make sure those who came to help are trustworthy?” he asked her.

“Sure can! We can play some more games!” she told him excitedly, making sure not to raise her voice too much.

Stephen nodded his thanks and left the room. He called Dewdrop.

“Stev- I mean Stephen! Everything okay?” Dewdrop said as she answered the phone.

Stephen could hear two voices in the background. One seemed to be comforting the other. “Yeah, everything’s great. We had a busy night, but the diamonds just told me that helpers are arriving. Can you make sure everyone from the past stays busy and out of the way until I can go through the gems who came to help? I don’t want another Bluebird situation.” He told her.

“Oh! I should help you.” Dewdrop started. “It’ll go a lot faster with the two of us. Volley can watch over Pearl and they can go and make sure our Amethysts are staying out of trouble.” She finished.

Stephen smiled, he almost wanted to say no but he couldn’t beat her logic. He hadn’t really wanted Dewdrop to have to deal with the diamonds. However, he did appreciate the help, even if he felt like he didn’t necessarily need it. “Sure, thanks! I’ll meet you back at the main hall then.” He told her, hanging up as he made his way to the diamonds. Hopefully, they wouldn’t have too many problems finding gems to help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed Gem Tag. It was actually pretty fun to write. 
> 
> Also, I imagined Takeover as a strategy game similar to Risk with Monopoly mixed in. XD
> 
> While Dewdrop was on the phone with Stephen. Volley was comforting Pearl because Pearl freaked out thinking Steven was in trouble lol. Wanted to add that in here since I might not address it later on and wanted to explain for those paying attention ;)


End file.
